Every morning right around 6:45 Gary and Julie have a local class from Kiss Country recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Julie K. has visited numerous schools throughout Caddo, Bossier and Red River parish. The kids, ranging in grades from pre-K to 12, are recorded reciting the pledge and then photographed so they can be featured on air and on our website as our “Kiss Class of the Day”.

Different schools recite the pledge a little differently when it comes to “One nation Under God.” Is there a comma or no? Whether you say it with a pause or not, all the kids we’ve met and their teachers love reciting it and do so with honor.

That’s why this story angers us!!

A New Jersey family is suing their child's School District and its superintendent, seeking to have the phrase "under God" removed from the Pledge of Allegiance that students recite every day. And the family filing the suit wants to remain anonymous.  Why?

The lawsuit filed in Superior Court on behalf of the family and the American Humanist Association claims acknowledging God discriminates against atheists which is a violation of the state's constitution. The American Humanist Association is a Washington, D.C.-based, nonprofit organization that works to protect the rights of atheists, humanists and other non-religious Americans. The lawsuit goes on to say that by pledging allegiance the superintendent and school district "publicly disparages plaintiffs' religious beliefs, calls plaintiffs' patriotism into question, portrays plaintiffs as outsiders and second-class citizens, and forces (the child) to choose between non-participation in a patriotic exercise or participation in a patriotic exercise that is invidious to him and his religious class."

Attorneys for the district say they are following “state law that requires pupils to recite the Pledge of Allegiance daily”.

New Jersey isn’t the first state to do this.  The Massachusetts Supreme Court is considering a similar issue in a suit against one of their school districts.

FYI…the original pledge of allegiance written in 1892 did not include “under God”. Those words were added in 1954 when then President Eisenhower encouraged Congress to add them in response to the Communist threat of the times.

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