Liberty and Justice for All: The Pledge of Allegiance

By F. Andrew Wolf, Jr. PhD

On an early fall morning, 132 years ago today, thousands of kids at schools throughout America rose together and looked up to a crisp, new American flag in their classroom. They then began to recite in unison the Pledge of Allegiance, 23 words authored by an American few today honor or even remember.

“I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands – one nation indivisible – with liberty and justice for all.”

But these few words constitute a far weightier statement about America than is generally acknowledged.

The Winding Path of the Pledge

Although the first version of America's “pledge” was written after the Civil War by Union Army Captain George Thatcher Balch, it was another American who penned the version we recite (with a few changes) today.

It is said that Francis Bellamy wrote the Pledge of Allegiance 1892 in only a few hours. But it was the result of several years of effort at one of America’s bestselling magazines, Youth’s Companion. In a marketing campaign, the Companion decided to offer US flags to readers who marketed subscriptions. Coincident with the approaching 400th anniversary of Columbus’ landing in America, the magazine decided to offer “Old Glory” to all public schools across the US and honor it with an oath.

Bellamy, a onetime Baptist minister, was at the time a writer for the Companion. Historian Richard J. Ellis, in his work, To the Flag: The Unlikely History of the Pledge of Allegiance, notes that Bellamy's writings were loaded with marketing rhetoric and political espousals. Bellamy argued that pledging allegiance would ensure “that the distinctive principles of true Americanism will not perish as long as free, public education endures.”

The pledge changed in 1923 during a National Flag Conference led by the American Legion and the Daughters of the American Revolution. It was determined that “my flag” should be changed to “the flag of the United States,” lest immigrant children be unclear which flag they’re pledging allegiance to.

Also of note: The version written by the ordained minister didn’t include the phrase “under God.” With the advent of World War II, many public schools instituted morning recitations. And a slight modification was made during the “Cold War” – President Eisenhower added “under God” in 1954 – essentially to distinguish the US from atheistic Communism, giving us the version we know today:

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Today, almost all states mandate public schools to schedule time for the pledge – only Hawaii, Vermont and Wyoming do not. Moreover, Congress begins each day with the pledge. Then there’s the US naturalization ceremony, during which America's new citizens take the oath. Not a bad history for words that began as a PR stunt.

Capturing the Spirit of America: Liberty and Justice

Today, the pledge has its share of critics, especially postmodernists, modern liberal secularists, or those with no religious belief in the divine. Ellis acknowledged that some today see the oath as an “anachronism,” but he also admired its hopeful quality – the spirit of its Spartan text.

What is so compelling about Bellamy’s words is its affirmation of universal principles. They arrive late in the piece, but they pack a powerful philosophical punch. Two principles are given voice: liberty and justice. But it’s the ending to the pledge – “liberty and justice for all,” – that transforms abstract concepts into concrete obligations which the state must effect for all Americans.

In the pledge, liberty and justice are no longer abstractions; rather, they are tangible responsibilities which a government, bound by constitutional restraint through the Bill of Rights, is charged to honor and respect. Echoing British philosopher John Locke, the Declaration of Independence asserts that all people have inalienable rights (liberty especially), and that the government's central purpose is to defend those rights.

Freedom vs Obligation: ‘For All’ Requires a Balance

Classical liberalism as articulated in the Declaration holds that a divine providence “endowed” humanity with rights that are inalienable and therefore natural – not a function of human intervention. It holds further that there is a natural law which operates as an ethical principle from which natural rights are derived and through which humans recognize their liberty. British political theorist Isaiah Berlin called them negative rights, as they are freedoms we have which cannot be taken from us by anyone including a government. Yet, Berlin also spoke of positive rights, which are granted by the government. These are of human derivation and operate to grant rights to Americans based on the government’s obligation to achieve liberty and justice for all – social equality.

Positive rights, granted by the government, impact the liberty (freedom) of everyone in America. And this is true (irrespective of whether one benefits from the right) by virtue of the fact that all assume the costs – the obligation – (financially or socially) associated with those rights.

“Liberty and justice for all,” as declared in our pledge can only be achieved if our natural right to freedom is protected to a degree commensurate with that of achieving social equality – otherwise justice will not be served. The granting of any positive right has the effect of impacting our natural right to freedom.

Congress has legislated an abundance of laws for the purpose of promoting social equality in America, but two stand out from the pack: Social Security and Affirmative Action.

Social Security is the application of a positive right to achieve social equality for all Americans. Yet that right constitutes an obligation imposed on the people in the form of a tax, thereby impinging upon financial freedom.

This is not to say that social security does not have a positive impact on American society – simply that when the government decides to grant a right to anyone (irrespective of who does or does not benefit from it), it has an obligation to effect social equality in such a way that justice for all is served. That entails protecting the natural right of individual freedom for all. It means mitigating the impact on freedom such that as much equality as possible is achieved with the least possible effect on individual freedom consistent with societal needs.

To achieve social equality by legislating it in the form of positive rights implies a corresponding impact on our natural right to freedom. It does this by imposing upon Americans the obligation to bear the cost – either financially or through some form of social impact on one's life. Affirmative Action is an example of the latter.

Affirmative Action in America was seen as a necessary effort to give all Americans the opportunity and resources needed to achieve social equality in society. It was about the “common good.” But this also came with several social costs in the form of change in educational pursuits and in hiring practices (e.g. quotas in businesses and colleges) as well as imposed allocation of resources (forced busing and integration of schools) and taxes to fund these social needs – both of which affected individual freedom.

The issue is not whether positive rights are “good or bad.” Rather, it is in determining how positive rights are affected with as minimal a cost to individual freedom as possible, consistent with society’s needs for social equality. How the balance between those two is implemented is what provides the basis for “liberty and justice for all.”

The controlling issue is the last phrase of the pledge – “for all.” Through those two words, in effect what the pledge refers to is a fair and equitable division of resources, opportunities, and privileges in society. How one effects the division of the latter in society determines whether justice for all is served. And that only occurs when freedoms are protected. The Bill of Rights is there, specifically, to limit the power of the federal government for that very purpose.

America's Pledge of Allegiance is a far weightier philosophical declaration than is typically recognized by those who recite it. It deals with the very essence of who we are as a people, what we value and what we are unwilling to surrender in our lives: “…liberty and justice for all.”

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Andrew Wolf, Jr. is director of The Fulcrum Institute, an organization of scholars dedicated to the classical liberal tradition. He has also been published stateside in American Spectator, The Thinking Conservative, and American Thinker, as well as abroad in International Policy Digest, Times of Israel, and The Daily Philosophy, among others.