The great-granddaughter of the author of the original Pledge writes a NY Times letter to justify omitting the under God. Apparently he was a socialist who believed that private schools should be abolished so that the state could uniformly indoctrinate kids in non-religious schools, and that the Pledge should reflect that ideology!

The 9th Circuit made a big deal out of claiming that "under God" was added to the pledge in order to promote religion. But apparently the phrase was left out of the original Pledge for the purpose of attacking religious education. All this is just more evidence that looking at the purpose for such things is not very helpful. Why should the court consider pro-religion evidence, but not anti-religion evidence?