Free Republic

Michael Newdow, perhaps America's best known atheist, has a new target in his personal war against God in the public culture: "In God We Trust" on U.S. money. "I am about to file to get 'In God We Trust' off the front of our currency," he told the Oklahoman. "I plan to do that this week."

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - An atheist who has spent years trying to ban recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools is now challenging the national motto printed on U.S. currency. Michael Newdow said Sunday that he planned to file a federal lawsuit this week asking for the removal of the national motto, "In God We Trust," from U.S. coins and dollar bills. He claims it's an unconstitutional endorsement of religion and "excludes people who don't believe in God." Newdow, a Sacramento doctor and lawyer who is an avowed atheist, used a similar argument when he challenged the Pledge of...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. The atheist who's spent years trying to ban recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools says he'll file a new lawsuit this week. Michael Newdow says he'll ask a federal court to order removal of the national motto "In God We Trust" from U-S coins and currency. He says it violates the religious rights of atheists who belong to his "First Amendment Church of True Science." The church's "three suggestions" are "question, be honest and do what's right." Newdow says it wouldn't be right to take up a collection when the money says "In God We...

Group Sees Hypocrisy in Schools' Embracing 'Gay Pride,' Rejecting 'In God We Trust'The same school board that ignored parents' objections and allowed what many regard as a "gay pride" flag to be placed in a Livingston County, Michigan, high school has repeatedly rejected the idea of displaying posters featuring the U.S. national motto "In God We Trust."Despite outrage from pro-family community members, Howell (Michigan) High School has refused to take down the rainbow-colored "diversity flag" that some students and parents who associate the emblem with homosexual pride find offensive. However, when the group called the Livingston Organization for Values in...

I'm sure that many of you have now read "Angels & Demons". It answered for me (a Canadian) a question I'd always had about the American dollar bill ... "what in hell is that pyramid with the big eyeball on it on the back of the bill ???" It's a Masonic symbol. But the questions STILL remain: 1/Why do Americans have a Masonic symbol on their currency? Do most Americans even have a clue what the Masons stand for? 2/ How do Americans reconcile themselves with the two contradictory messages on the back of the bill: Novus Ordo Seclorum (New...

The words appear on every dollar bill and US coin. They are displayed at the entrance to the US Senate and above the Speaker's chair in the House. But when local officials in North Carolina placed "In God We Trust" on the front of the Davidson County Government Center, they soon found themselves in federal court facing a complaint that they were violating the separation of church and state. The display was mounted in 18-inch letters that passing motorists could see on nearby Interstate 85. "If you are going to get sued, you may as well get sued for big...

RICHMOND, Va. – The inscription "In God We Trust" on the facade of a government building in North Carolina does not violate the U.S. Constitution's guidelines on the separation of church and state, a federal appeals court ruled Friday. A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously upheld a lower judge's dismissal of a lawsuit challenging the slogan written on the Davidson County Government Center in Lexington, N.C. The inscription, in 18-inch block letters, was paid for with donations from individuals and churches in 2002. Lawyers Charles F. Lambeth Jr. and Michael D. Lea, who regularly...

I have been looking at myself, and millions of my brethren, fellow evangelicals along with traditional Catholics, in a ghastly arcade mirror lately -- courtesy of this newspaper and the New York Times. Readers have been assured, among other dreadful things, that we are living in "a theocracy" and that this theocratic federal state has reached the dire level of -- hold your breath -- a "jihad." In more than 50 years of direct engagement in and observation of the major news media I have never encountered anything remotely like the fear and loathing lavished on us by opinion mongers...

Government officials in Pasco County, Florida, were seeking legal advice in late January about the constitutionality of hanging “In God We Trust” banners throughout the county library system. The opinion was being requested because the county’s Republican Party chairman is pressing county commission members to hang the banners, saying some 30 “In God We Trust” plaques are already mounted in other public buildings there. “This country was founded on Judeo-Christian values,” said Bill Bunting in the January 22 Tampa Tribune, adding that atheists who disapprove of such a display “can put a banner over it and take [the banner] down...

Did you know that if we declare the words "In God We Trust" unconstitutional we will have to do away with our National Anthem? Atheists on the talk shows have tried to convice us that "E Pluribus Unum" - Latin for "from many, one" - is America's real historical motto. This is revisionist history and ignores the words of our National Anthem - "the Star Spangled Banner" - written in 1814 by attorney Francis Scott Key as he watched Americans defend Fort McHenry in Baltimore Harbor from British attack. Here's the third verse of our anthem, which not only names...

"Calling it the "cornerstone of being an American," a McAlester, Oklahoma lawmaker this year returned the words "In God We Trust" to thousands of public school classrooms. The Legislature passed HB 2477 authorizing school districts to display the national motto in classrooms and hallways, at the discretion of administrators and teachers. Gov. Brad Henry signed the bill in May, and it took effect July 1."

OCEANSIDE, Calif. — "In God We Trust" (search) is the national motto, and now one California town plans to make it part of its official seal. Oceanside's city seal will have the words "In God We Trust" below its logo. "Liberty" will be written out above it. The measure was voted down twice last year, but earlier this month during a spirited council meeting in which more than 100 residents spoke out -- mostly in favor of the idea -- the Oceanside (search) City Council passed unanimously a plan to add the words to its logo, where it can be...

OCEANSIDE ---- "In God We Trust" will soon grace the walls of City Council chambers and it will hang with a friend called "liberty." The council voted unanimously Wednesday to install the national motto under the city seal that hangs on the wall behind the council dais, and agreed at the urging of Councilwoman Esther Sanchez to include the word "liberty" as a show of support to the troops in Iraq. To reach consensus, the council scrapped the original 3-foot-by-4-foot design that featured the motto arched over a spread eagle. Instead the word "liberty" will soon be installed in a...

What you believe or not In God WE Trust. Keep this moving, it speaks for itself. Samuel Thompson wrote: "I don't believe in Santa Claus, but I'm not going to sue somebody for singing a Ho-Ho-Ho song in December." I don't agree with Darwin, but I didn't go out and hire a lawyer when my high school teacher taught his theory of evolution. Life, liberty or your pursuit of happiness will not be endangered because someone says a 30-second prayer before a football game. So what's the big deal? It's not like somebody is up there reading the entire book...

Judge requests religion-neutral oaths 3-12-04 Posted 8 a.m. LEXINGTON (AP) — A district court judge has asked local officials to remove religious references, including oaths that end "so help me God" and a traditional blessing for the state and court, in courtrooms when he presides. Judge James M. Honeycutt said in a letter that the court system is seeing an increasing number of people from other cultures that are not necessarily Christian. "I believe that the burden should not be on those individuals to speak up and request an oath that does not mention God or use the Christian Bible,"...

CHRISTIANS if you really care, GET UP AND DO SOMETHING!!! JOIN THE MARCH ON OUR STATE'S CAPITOLS EASTER SUNDAY at 3:00PM!!! 1 Million Christians in each state marching on their own state capitol = a 50 million Christian march! Here is why: We believe America is founded on Christian values and we despise the judiciary for acting as dictators removing our history from public places. We stand together to tell the Senate to confirm the judges the President has nominated. Federal Judges are not elected and answer to no one. They are stealing our right to express our religious freedom....

<p>The U.S. Supreme Court has set March 24 as the date it will hear oral arguments over whether public school students can be required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance with the words “under God.”</p> <p>The case involves the Elk Grove Unified School District and parent Michael Newdow of Sacramento. Newdow’s daughter attends school in Elk Grove.</p>

There is a force above the 'Almighty, Ever-to-be-worshipped' Law, righteousness. When the law is in conflict with righteousness, I side against the "almighty, ever to be worshipped, kneeled to" Law. If I did not side with righteousness, I would be worshipping law, would I not? Law would become my god, just as government was supposed to be the god of all loyal marxists. There is no difference, whatsoever, between placing law above righteousness and being a totalitarian tyrant demanding blind, marxist loyalty. Law is made for our civilization to funtion. It is a mere tool. And in this case, that...

<p>CAPE CANAVERAL -- A NASA manager criticized for his role in the Columbia disaster was tapped Friday to direct a new safety and engineering watchdog group that will oversee all space agency programs.</p> <p>Ralph Roe, a former shuttle program manager reassigned in the wake of the Feb. 1 accident, will head up the NASA Engineering and Safety Center at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va.</p>

WRITE IT ON THE BACK OF YOUR ENVELOPES You may have heard in the news that a couple of Post Offices in Texas have been forced to take down small posters that say"IN GOD WE TRUST." The law, they say, is being violated. It is something silly about electioneering posters (is God running for office)? Anyway, I heard proposed on a radio station show, that we all write "IN GOD WE 'TRUST" on the back of all our mail. After all, that is our national motto, and it's on all the money we use to buy those stamps. I think...