Matawan-Aberdeen District Defends Pledge from Atheist Attack

By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog

FlagHave you heard about the plaintiffs in Monmouth County who are trying to kick the Pledge of Allegiance out of the Matawan-Aberdeen Regional School District, Save Jerseyans?

Angry radical secularism is a slow creep. At first, atheists were content to simply have their children abstain from reciting the pledge which, since the 1950s, includes the phrase “under God.”

Now the “American Humanist Association” says the ability to abstain isn’t consequential; its attorneys are arguing that the pledge violates Article 1 of the New Jersey constitution. On Wednesday, A state Superior Court Judge David Bauman entertained oral argument on a motion, filed by the school district, to dismiss the lawsuit. He hasn’t issued a decision as Friday afternoon.

Legislative Republicans are taking a proactive approach.

Assemblyman Ron Dancer of Ocean County, who is also currently sponsoring a fetal homicide bill, has introduced legislation that explicitly protects (but does not require) the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance at all New Jersey public meetings including state, county and local proceedings as well as school sessions. 

“For years, the courts have consistently upheld the reciting of our Pledge of Allegiance to the flag, yet thousands of public taxpayer dollars continue to be spent defending the Pledge,” said Asm. Dancer. “This legislation will, for the first time, permit the courts to award attorney fees and costs to any New Jersey public body or public employee that wins such a lawsuit.

“Recovering taxpayers’ funds spent to defend the Pledge of Allegiance from objectors is overdue,” he continued. “Our school tax dollars are better spent on the students in the classroom, rather than attorneys in the court room.”

Amazingly, no such protection currently exists in either the state constitution or state statute. Asm. Dancer thinks it’s long-past time to change that.

“If anyone wants to remain silent during the Pledge of Allegiance that is their right,” he concluded. “But it is not their right to silence us and make us pay to defend a right that was paid for by the men and women of our armed services.”

 

Matt Rooney
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MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com's founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of 'The Matt Rooney Show' on 1210 WPHT every Sunday evening from 7-10PM EST.