And this is the fundamental flaw of your approach. You have a choice of definitions to use - you chose the one that fits your desired outcome, as opposed to the one most suited for the situation.
Establish means “to make (a church) a national or state institution.”
Now, you can argue this doesn’t do that. I’d argue it certainly would be a law “respecting” such “establishment.” But to chose a different definition completely - well that’s not cricket.
OK, that’s fair. I didn’t include that definition because I thought it was obvious that it didn’t apply here. That’s the trouble with eight sycophantic justices; they won’t dissent and give me points to address that I miss.
“Establish” can also mean “…to make (a church) a national or state institution.” This doesn’t do that. It accords no special legal status to any particular church. It’s obvious what it means to have a church be a national religion; the Founders saw that with the Church of England. In no way does adding “under God” to the pledge come anywhere near according any special status to any particular church.
As a poster, not a Mod, I was pointing out that you are not doing your case or your blood pressure any good by engaging in the same sort of silliness in which he specializes. Feel free to post as you wish (within the rules, of course).
Which is why we have to look at the whole phrase.
“No law” - in other words not no law as long as it isn’t de minimis.
“respecting an establishment” - not establishing, but respecting an establishment. In other words, it isn’t just don’t have a state church, it’s don’t even set foot on the road towards a state church.
“of religion” - not of a religion, but of religion in general. So it isn’t referring to favoring one church - according any special status to any particular church over others, but instead to granting special status to any particular church, or to religion in general.
I mean, if you don’t want to look at the actual wording of the law you are enforcing, that’s fine. But some of us think it’s the best starting spot for analysis. 
I don’t know if it helped my case or not. But it did WONDERS for my blood pressure.
From now on, this is going to be my response to obstinate and vexatious refusals to debate. Two requests for cites, and then I’m going to assume the interest is in simply repeating unsupported claims, and respond in kind.
Sure. But I don’t agree with your “other words” – and as further evidence that the actual words don’t mean what you say they do, we can look to the actions of the very men who approved them. The day the final agreement was reached by the 1st Congress on the First Amendment, they also passed a resolution asking President Washington to urge all people to come together “…humbly offering [of their] prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations . . . and [to] beseech Him to pardon [their] national and other transgressions.”
So I know your version is not what those words mean, because the guys that WROTE the words didn’t agree with your version.
You may want to use your crazy and high faluting concepts like intent of the writers to over-rule plain meaning of text, but I don’t interpret laws that way, thank you very much.
If a law says X, and the people who wrote it meant Y, then X is the law.
If (and only if) X is unclear, then Y, according to us filthy liberals, can be used to interpret X.
But where X is clear, as it is here, then Y is about as relevant as the price of smoked haddock in Arbroath to the legal analysis.
How is it clear? How do you imagine that “respecting an establishment of religion,” means the same thing as “don’t even set foot on the road towards a state church.” How is that remotely self-evident?
I agree that if the law says X, it’s X. Here, X may mean several things, none of which are reached by “under God.”
It’s clear because it is the only meaning consistent with the wording. The other meanings suggested could have been achieved with other more common owrd constructions.
Then again, I don’t think textual analysis can be done without bringing in personal prejudices. It’s as results oriented as any other mechanism of interpreting the law, but with the added danger of refusing to admit it.
I’m not. I am a little worried that you claim you do, because you’re usually quite reasonable about this stuff. There are certainly reasonable arguments to be made for your side, but the one you’re making right now isn’t one of them.
So your view is that the words are not only generally clear, but there’s not really any ambiguity?
Then what were those guys thinking? I mean, so many people were involved in voting to approve the First Amendment. And most of those same people went on to immediately violate it.
How could this be, if your idea is correct?
Slavery was of historic and traditional significance, for thousands of years, even to the beginning of human history. Yet the court decided it was time to rectify a traditional wrong. So apparently tradition isn’t the strongest argument to use here.
Um…no, the Court didn’t decide to rectify slavery.
The People did, by passing the Thirteenth Amendment. That’s the one that says, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
Have you really gone through life thinking we ended slavery because of a court decision?
Let’s try this again.
Discrimination against certain races was of historic and traditional significance, for thousands of years, even to the beginning of human history. Yet the court decided (in Brown) it was time to rectify a traditional wrong. So apparently tradition isn’t the strongest argument to use here. And I did provide a legal reference, just to make you happy.
The “respecting” language was not put in to expand the things the federal government could not do that would approach establishing a church. It was put in to prevent the federal government from dis-establishing the established state churches, such as New Hampshire’s official Congregationalist church.
See Akhil Amar’s The Bill of Rights page 32 and the numerous cites in endnote #62.
It’s true: the court decided in Briwn to buck not only tradition, but established precedent in Plessey, and changed our view of the constitution’s commands.
So how, from that, do you draw the conclusion that the court must always discard tradition?
In Griswold, the Court drew on our nation’s tradition --and NOT any written command – to decide that we have a right to privavcy that forbids a state from refusing to sell contraceptives to married couples. In Roe, the Court drew upon Griswold’s reasoning to assert that the Constitution says states cannot interfere with first-term abortions.
I assume you would not offer the same argument as you just did if we were discussing the holdings in Griswold and Roe. So while I agree that tradition doesn’t always drive the court, I assume YOU agree that it certainly legitimately can.
I love, by the way, how you simply dismiss the fact that you somehow believed the courts overturned slavery with not even a comment, as though it’s a non-essential little side issue. I suppose in this cinversation it is, but seriously – not even an ambarrassed “Shucks?”
Look how easy it is: oops! I left two typos in the above. My bad!
How ambarrassing.
If that’s the level of discourse you have to descend to, it’s over and you’ve lost by a unanimous vote.
We know how much you hate the concept of substantive due process, but it is law nevertheless. You can’t pretend to respect that only when it suits your end.
“My” attack?
I obviously disagree with you on whether it has religious significance or not. So let me propose a solution - let us add to it, instead of remove. There are plenty of points of interest within your nation’s past that I would consider worthy of inclusion in a loyalty pledge, either in terms of affect on country or moral rightness. Obviously the pledge already has nods to some of those things; liberty, justice. But I think that, if “under God”, an insignificant nod, is considered worthy of inclusion, surely there are many more significant nods that should be, also? Freedom seems like a good one. Perhaps some statement as to opposition of tyranny, perhaps even the original opposition to the British Empire? A statement specifically against slavery and miscegenation would strike me as appropriate, some mention of desire and previous action enforcing certain principles abroad, perhaps something on capitalism would work.
But of course the pledge is short, so we can’t fit everything under the sun in. We have to prioritise. So which additions would you say are of similar importance to the nation as a nod to God?
Edit: I would add that my “attack” on it is not premised on the view that it is religious specifically. I would be equally opposed to a pledge containing “certainly not under any kinds of gods”.