One Nation Under God
Extension of Remarks of
Hon. John Stennis
Of Mississippi
In the Senate of the United States
Tuesday, September 17, 1963

Mr. Stennis: Mr. President, the splendid letter written by the Reverend Marion Gordon Robertson, associate pastor of the Freemason Street Baptist Church, Norfolk, Va., to the editor of the Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, has come to my attention. In his letter, Mr. Robertson discusses the recent Supreme Court decision banning prayer and Bible reading from the public schools, and presents a forceful argument indeed that our children should be taught at least that we are "one nation under God."

Mr. Robertson, the son of our distinguished colleague, the junior Senator from Virginia (Mr. Robertson), has an unusual, if not unique, background. He received his B.A. degree from Washington and Lee University, magna cum laude, just after his 20th birthday, and went on to receive his LL.B. degree from Yale Law School, and then his theological degree from one of the outstanding nonsectarian theological seminaries in the Nation.

Mr. Robertson is thus able to discuss and view the recent Court decision from both the legal and theological background, and his splendid letter is worthy of the special reading of every Member of the Congress and the entire Nation. I ask unanimous consent that the letter from Mr. Robertson, appearing in the September 8 Virginian-Pilot, be inserted in the Appendix of the Record.

There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record as follows:
(from the Virginian-Pilot, Sept.8, 1963)
United States Rests Squarely on Bible
Editor, Virginian-Pilot:

In your editorial of September 2 you took Virginia's Senators to task for criticizing the recent Supreme Court decision banning prayer and Bible reading from the public schools, while at the same time you affirm that these decisions are a true support of our liberties. I must disagree with you on both philosophic and legal grounds.

In the first place, we must recognize that every pragmatic expression of government rests on certain underlying philosophic principles. The Governments of Soviet Russia and Red China rest squarely on a materialistic view of history which is regarded as a religion. The Fascism of Hitler's Germany grew out of a distorted view of racial supremacy, and the wars of aggression came from Hitler's desire for lebenstraum for the master race. The monarchies of the 17th century rested on the theory of the divine right of kings. Even today a new nation of Israel is being founded squarely on the principles of the Old Testament.

In the case of the United States of America there is no question that our ideas of government, individual liberty, private property and initiative, education, and personal morality rest squarely in a personal God and the Holy Bible as the revelation of that God. It is in these things, and not in our material prosperity, that we differ from reactionary communism. How utterly absurd it is to tell our children that our country is good, while at the same time denying them the experiential understanding of how it got that way.

Schools in Russia and Red China teach the Marxist-Leninist "religiion" day in and day out. In Israel children are indoctrinated in the Old Testament principles. In almost every other nation children are shown the reasons behind their way of life. Yet in the United States, by Supreme Court fiat, some 80 percent of the population is being told that ethical humanism is now replacing theism in our public life. And make no mistake about it, ethical humanism is a religion.

In the second place, the Supreme Court decision does not rest on sound constitutional law. It has always been the prevailing constitutional rule that the task of the Supreme Court was not to write laws but to interpret a document and the decisions flowing from it. In order to do this the justices were to examine certain historical papers shedding light on the intent of the framers of the Constitution. It is the height of folly to believe that the men who brought forth this document out of a prayer meeting ever intended that there should be no devotional expression in schools. If this was what the framers of the Constitution intended, why has it taken 170 years for this fact to come to light?

Instead, the Supreme Court has read into the establishment of religion clause a meaning totally alien to the framers, past history and tradition, as well as the prevailing American folkways. I assure you our liberties have not been safeguarded when the judiciary usurps the role of the legislature in order to take away the things on which our liberty is predicated.

M.G. Robertson
President,
The Christian Broadcasting Network, Inc.