By John Jalsevac
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 14, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – This past Wednesday, July 12, the United States Senate unanimously passed resolution S. Con. Res. 96, which requests senators and all American citizens “To commemorate, celebrate, and reaffirm the national motto of the United States on the 50th anniversary of its formal adoption.”
The passage of the Senate resolution comes only a few days after a California federal trial judge dismissed the lawsuit filed by Michael Newdow challenging the constitutionality of the American national motto, “In God We Trust.”
Co-sponsor of the resolution, Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson, in bringing forward the resolution said that part of his motivation for so doing was that it is “important to reaffirm our traditions at a time when there are misguided court challenges to the fundamental principles that have been a part of America since its birth.”
Focus on the Family Chairman James C. Dobson, Ph.D. responded to the passage of the resolution, saying “It is heartening to see the men and women elected to serve the people formally acknowledge once again the true source of the blessings we enjoy as a nation. It has become increasingly distressing to watch activist courts from one coast to the other try to scrub every last vestige of our Christian heritage from the public square—whether it’s ordering Ten Commandments displays out of public buildings or ruling ‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional.
“Some will say this vote in the Senate is a meaningless symbolic gesture, but what it symbolizes is vital to the future of the United States and all of us who call her home. We will only continue to enjoy the freedoms and greatness that have been our legacy for the last 230 years if we continue to acknowledge the Lord as the creator and protector of our land. We call on the members of the House to follow their colleagues’ example and pass this resolution soon.
“As President Ronald Reagan said, if we ever cease to be a nation under God, we will be a nation gone under.”
The phrase “In God We Trust” enjoys a long tradition of use in the United States. One stanza of the Star Spangled Banner, written by Francis Scott Key in 1814, has a version of the national motto, proclaiming, “In God is our trust!” The phrase, however, did not become the official motto of the United States until much later, when, on July 30, 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed H. J. Res. 396 (84th Congress).