by A. C. Kleinheider

I was sitting in the stands fully enjoying an afternoon of Minor League Baseball last summer when down in front of me I heard, in a relatively thick southern accent,

"Boy, exactly what part of RED CHINA are you from anyway?"

Apparently, the exclaimer's associate had never had a corndog or a funnel-cake or some other such definitively American thing.

The exclamation sums up quite nicely my initial knee-jerk reaction when I heard about Tennessee State Representative Henri Brooks' (D-Memphis) refusal to either stand or leave the chamber while her fellow legislators were pledging allegiance to the American Flag. Brooks declared that the Speaker Rep. Jimmy Naifeh had acted like a slave master by suggesting that she stand and pledge allegiance to a flag that had enslaved her forebears. I thought what is this woman's problem? She takes an interest and runs for office seeking to represent her friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens in a deliberative body and then won't participate in a rather bland ritual of patriotism.

I mean what is she a "Commie"?

Let us, for the moment, ignore whether or not Ms. Brooks is now, or has ever been, a member of the Communist Party. Let us put aside whatever reasons she has (personal, political, or racial) for refusing to recite the Pledge and look at exactly what the Pledge is and whether her refusal amounts to a lack of patriotism.

Many people don't realize that the Pledge did not originate from the Founding Fathers or even the early days of the Republic (ΰ la the Star Spangled Banner). The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by a Baptist minister named Francis Bellamy. Francis Bellamy was a self-described socialist. His ideas and "allegiances" had very little to do with the constitutional republicanism envisioned by our founders. Bellamy was explicit about this:

“What does that vast thing, the Republic mean? It is the concise political word for the Nation — the One Nation which the Civil War was fought to prove. To make that One Nation idea clear, we must specify that it is indivisible, as Webster and Lincoln used to repeat in their great speeches.”

Now, conservatives, not merely the "Big R" Republican sycophants but true conservatives that value this nation's "small r" republican virtues, should know our republic is very much "divisible". Conservatives should know that our Republic is divisible into states and that those states are sovereign. Conservatives should be aware that our Constitution's Tenth Amendment states that,

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people".

Before any American can pledge allegiance to anything they should know what they are pledging allegiance to and what the words they are mouthing really mean.

Our first allegiance should be to our families, our communities, and our states because only then can we ever be truly loyal to the idea and principles of the American Nation.

But didn't we fight a war that did indeed prove that this nation was "indivisible"?

Yes, we fought a Civil War. One of the great side effects of that war was the eradication of chattel slavery. Unfortunately, along with millions and millions of men needlessly killed, another side effect of the War was the degradation of federalism in America. How can we really have a true federal system — true states' rights — if we cannot acknowledge that the states have the power to extricate themselves from the Union?

Francis Bellamy did not write the Pledge of Allegiance to show his patriotism. He wrote it to consolidate the revolutionary idea that America was not a confederation of states — but one nation, indivisible. It is an elegant and successful piece of propaganda. We have repeated the phrase "one nation, indivisible" so many times that it has become extremely hard to rekindle the spirit of federalism because, consciously or unconsciously, we don't really believe it anymore.

What kind of nation is it that demands allegiance anyway? Isn't that the stuff of reeducation camps and the Hitler Youth? Forced pledges of allegiance are not for secure governments and free people; they are for insecure regimes and conquered serfs. Whether we are simple citizens or elected officials we should never be forced to mouth words we don't believe so that those who mean to rule us may feel more secure.

Unfortunately, Representative Brooks did not refuse to recite the pledge with her fellow legislators for the righteous cause of freedom or federalism. She did it out of ignorance. She refused to pledge allegiance to the flag because it "represented those colonies that formerly enslaved [her] ancestors".

Certainly, at one time Old Glory did fly over a nation that permitted her ancestors to be enslaved. Of course, being darn near 150 years ago, the flag had fewer stars back then. Brooks seems to have forgotten that soldiers flying those colors freed her ancestors. Being a liberal Democrat one would think Brooks would be quite content with our Federal Government. The Federal Government that Representative Brooks is so upset with not only freed the slaves; it broke up segregation and enacted the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In her estimation, programs such as the New Deal, The Great Society, Affirmative Action, etc. were no doubt outstanding and necessary for "her ancestors". The Federal government has ripped up the Constitution, opened up the treasury, and bent over backwards in no small part to help "her ancestors" so I don't exactly understand her beef. Maybe she is holding out for reparations.

Should Representative Brooks have refused to either stand or leave the chamber while the pledge was recited? Probably not. As an elected official she should respect the traditions of the deliberative body to which she was elected.

The word "indivisible" and the unsavoriness of coerced patriotism, however principled, are not worth the public relations scrape. However, if she felt that strongly, common sense and manners would have dictated that she conduct the matter other than the way she did. Leaving the chamber quietly and issuing a press release more befits the dignity of a lady and a legislator than sitting down and doing paperwork until the Speaker approaches you — so that you can then accuse him of treating you like a slave.

This little fiasco in the "Volunteer" state should remind us to examine closely those traditions taken for granted as patriotic and to know their true origins so that, if and when we decide to, we will know exactly what we are pledging allegiance to.

June 12, 2001

Copyright © 2001 A. C. Kleinheider