Hello, and welcome to our deep dive. So if you
are walking, or maybe driving, or just sitting
at your desk right now, I want you to do something.
Reach into your pocket or your wallet. Assuming
you actually still carry physical cash, right?
Right, yeah. But if you do, just pull out a coin.
Honestly, it doesn't matter if it's a penny,
a quarter, or if you prefer paper money, grab
a $1 bill. Just pull it out and look really closely
at it. Because amidst all the intricate engraving
and the portraits of past presidents and all
those complex security features, there are four
ubiquitous words stamped right there in capital
letters. In God we trust. Exactly. In God we
trust. It is so familiar that our eyes literally
just glide right over it. We don't even process
it anymore. We really don't. But have you ever
actually stopped to ask yourself how those four
words got there? Like what does the physical
currency in your hands actually say about American
currency history? It says a lot more than people
think. It really does. So today. Our mission
is to explore the massive, winding, and I mean,
let's be honest, heavily debated Wikipedia file
on In God We Trust. We are going to unpack the
origins, the controversies, and the immense cultural
impact of the United States national motto. And
before we get into it, we need to set some ground
rules. because this topic touches the absolute
third rail of American politics and religion.
I mean, we are dealing directly with the separation
of church and state, left -wing secularism, right
-wing conservatism. It's a lot. It is a minefield.
Yeah. So our mission today is absolutely not
to take sides or spin the narrative. We are looking
strictly at the historical and legal record.
How did we get here? Yeah, I think it's important
to state right up front to you, the listener,
that the scope of the sources we're analyzing
today is just incredibly broad. Oh, for sure.
We are pulling from historical newspaper archives,
centuries of legislative records, numismatics,
which is the study of coins, and a very complex
web of legal precedents. Our timeline today spans
from the 18th century colonial era all the way
to 21st century lawsuits over state license plates.
Wow. So the objective is to impartially convey
the historical and legal facts exactly as they're
contained in the source material. We want to
give you the unvarnished history and the legal
context behind the money we use every single
day. OK, let's unpack this, because when I first
looked at the outline for this deep dive, I just
sort of assumed this phrase was coined by the
founding fathers. Yeah, most people do. Right.
Like I figured it was drafted alongside the Constitution
or maybe etched into the Liberty Bell or something.
But the earliest recorded English usage of this
exact motto actually predates the United States
itself. It does. It takes us back to January
1748. There was a report in the Pennsylvania
Gazette about the flags of Benjamin Franklin's
Pennsylvania militia. So I just have to ask,
why did Benjamin Franklin have a militia in the
first place? And why was this specific phrase
on their flag? So to understand that 1748 appearance,
we really have to look at the unique political
climate of colonial Pennsylvania. OK. Unlike
other colonies, Pennsylvania was founded by Quakers
who were strictly pacifists. Oh, right. No fighting.
Exactly. Because of their religious convictions,
the colonial government officially refused to
establish a state militia. And this was even
when they were actively threatened by French
and Spanish privateers during King George's War.
So the government is basically saying we're not
fighting no matter what. Pretty much. But Benjamin
Franklin, who was incredibly pragmatic, he realized
that they needed a defense force regardless of
the government's pacifism. So he organized this
massive volunteer militia and they called themselves
the Associators. The Associators. Okay, so these
Associators are essentially a privatized grassroots
defense force stepping in because the official
government just outright refuses to fight. Precisely.
And because they were volunteers drawn from all
these diverse trades and backgrounds, they needed
unifying symbols. So Franklin designed several
flags or colors for these regiments. And according
to that report in the Pennsylvania Gazette, one
of these flags featured a coronet, a plume of
feathers, and the motto, In God We Trust. That
is wild. But is there any record of where Franklin
actually pulled the phrase from? Like, was it
a common idiom at the time, or did he just invent
it for the flag? Well, it wasn't invented out
of whole cloth, but it also wasn't exactly a
common secular idiom either. What's fascinating
here is the literary and theological evolution
of the phrase. OK. Historians actually trace
the underlying sentiment to renderings of biblical
texts, specifically Psalm 56 .1. But the exact
phrase, in God we trust, emerges more distinctly
in the context of Isaac Watts Salter. Isaac Watts.
Who was he? Isaac Watts was an enormously popular
English hymn writer. in the early 18th century.
In his translation of Psalm 115, verses 9 through
11, Watts originally wrote the words, Britain
trust the Lord. Oh, wow. Britain trust the Lord.
Yeah. And his hymns were widely sung across the
colonies. So the cadence and the theological
concept of national trust in the divine were
already deeply ingrained in the colonial mindset.
But wait, if Watts wrote Britain trust the Lord,
how do we actually get to the Americanized in
God we trust? Was there a specific moment when
that text was altered? There was, and it happened
in 1785, right after the United States won its
independence. Oh, so they couldn't sing about
Britain anymore. Exactly. An American publisher
and poet named Joel Barlow recognized that the
newly independent nation obviously could no longer
sing hymns pledging trust to Britain. So Barlow
decided he needed to revise Watt Salter for an
American audience. Makes sense. His explicit
goal, as noted in the historical sources, was
to modify the hymns to purge them of their, and
this is a quote, un -American flavor. Un -American
flavor, wow. So he takes the line, Britain, trust
the Lord. and translates it instead as, In God
We Trust. So it was essentially an editorial
rebranding exercise, like Barlow was trying to
sever cultural ties with Britain and simultaneously
establish this distinct American religious identity.
It was exactly what it was. And once Barlow published
that revision, the phrase really started to gain
some real cultural traction. It caught on. It
did. By the early 19th century, it begins appearing
in highly significant national contexts. If we
move forward to the War of 1812, specifically
the bombardment of Fort McHenry in 1814, we see
the phrase adapted into our most famous patriotic
text. Right, Francis Scott Key. Yes. Francis
Scott Key, who was a lawyer trapped on a British
ship watching the bombardment, wrote the poem,
Defense of Fort McHenry, which eventually became
the Star -Spangled Banner. Yeah, and I think
most people only really know the first verse
of the National Anthem. But if you actually look
at the fourth stanza of that poem, Key wrote
the line, quote, And this be our motto, in God
is our trust. Did Key just pull that from Barlow's
hymnal or was it just a parallel evolution of
the same biblical concept? It is difficult to
definitively prove Key was directly quoting Barlow,
but it clearly demonstrates how thoroughly the
concept had permeated the American consciousness
by that point. It fit the poetic meter, and it
perfectly encapsulated the wartime reliance on
divine providence. And the sources show us that
this phrase had a remarkably broad cultural footprint
long before the government ever mandated it on
currency. For example, it became a rallying cry
for the abolitionist movement. Really? Yeah.
In 1845, a man named D .S. Whitney published
an anti -slavery hymn in the famous abolitionist
newspaper The Liberator. And that hymn utilized
the motto. I see in the notes that it wasn't
just abolitionists either. Fraternal organizations
were using it too. Yes, the independent order
of odd fellows used in God we trust. as their
official motto from the 1840s well into the 1870s.
It appeared on their seals, their literature,
and their lodge banners. Just imagine being a
citizen in the 1840s or 1850s. This phrase isn't
something handed down by federal law or stamped
by the U .S. Mint yet. It's totally a grassroots
sentiment. It's sung by abolitionists fighting
to end slavery. It's recited in fraternal lodges,
and it's woven into patriotic poetry. It was
everywhere in the culture. But how does a grassroots
phrase jump from poetry and hymnals onto the
physical money we use to buy groceries? From
what I'm reading in the outline, we have to look
at the Civil War for that shift. Yes. The 1860s
seemed to be the crucible where this motto officially
meets the medal. So what exactly was the catalyst?
The defining catalyst came in the form of a letter
dated November 13th, 1861. The nation was fracturing.
The Civil War was obviously underway. And a man
named Reverend Mark R. Watkinson, who was the
pastor of a Baptist church in Ridleyville, Pennsylvania,
petitioned the Treasury Department. OK, what
did he want? Watkinson wanted a statement. recognizing
Almighty God in some form on our coins. His stated
reasoning in the letter was to, quote, relieve
us from the ignominy of heathenism. The ignominy
of heathenism. That is some incredibly intense
fire and brimstone language to use in a bureaucratic
petition to the Treasury Department. It really
is. Was Watkinson implying that because the union
didn't have God on its money, they were somehow
fighting as heathens? Essentially, yes. To understand
Watkinson's theological anxiety there, we have
to look at the broader context of what historians
call the Divine Arms Race between the North and
the South during the Civil War. The Divine Arms
Race. Right. Both the Union and the Confederacy
were desperately attempting to claim that God
was exclusively on their side. The stakes were
existential. But the Union felt they were actively
losing the Divine Public Relations War. Why did
they feel that way? Because the Confederacy's
Constitution Right, in its preamble, explicitly
invoked the favor and guidance of Almighty God.
The U .S. Constitution, famously, makes no such
explicit invocation of the divine. Oh wow, I
didn't realize that about the Confederate Constitution.
Yeah, so because of this contrast... Union supporters
like Watkinson felt a profound religious insecurity.
They worried that without a public official acknowledgement
of God, the Union might lose the moral high ground
and perhaps even divine favor on the actual battlefield.
So if the Union felt they were falling behind
in the religious messaging, what exactly was
the Confederacy doing on their end? Were they
using the phrase, in God we trust as well? They
were actively using it. The sources detail several
specific examples of Confederate forces employing
the exact motto. There is a Confederate bunting.
which is a specialized flag, dated around late
1861 or early 1862, attributed to the 37th Arkansas
Infantry Regiment. And right in the center, it
has, in God we trust, printed on it. This flag
was actually later captured by the Union's 33rd
Iowa Infantry Regiment. Another Confederate flag
belonging to the 60th Tennessee Infantry Regiment
featured the exact same motto and was captured
at the Battle of Big Black River Bridge. So it
was literally being carried on to the battlefield
by the South. I also see a note here about a
report from Harper's Weekly in 1864. Yes. Harper's
Weekly reported that the Union Navy captured
a Confederate flag that read, our cause is just,
our duty we know, in God we trust, to battle
we go. The South even had a highly popular military
song called The Stars -Bangled Cross and the
Pure Field of White. And the refrain included
the lyrics, our trust is in God who can help
us in fight. So both sides were wielding this
concept as a weapon of morale and spiritual legitimacy.
Exactly. It was a propaganda tool. That puts
Watkinson's letter in a completely different
light. It wasn't just a random pastor asking
for a personal favor. It was a strategic plea
in the middle of a massive propaganda war. Precisely.
So how did the Union Treasury respond? Did they
just accept the letter and instantly start minting
new coins? It actually moved remarkably fast,
largely because of who was sitting in the Treasury
Secretary's chair at the time. Reverend Watkinson's
petition landed on the desk of Salmon P. Chase.
Who was President Abraham Lincoln's Secretary
of the Treasury. Right. And Chase was a lifelong...
deeply evangelical Episcopalian. He was known
for very public, sometimes ostentatious shows
of piety. So he didn't just file Watkinson's
letter away. He immediately directed the director
of the Philadelphia Mint, a man named James Pollock,
to begin drafting possible coin designs that
incorporated a religious phrase. I am so curious
about the actual drafting process. Did they immediately
settle on in God we trust or were there other
contenders being thrown around? There were definitely
several iterations. We actually have a historical
document from December 9th, 1863, a letter from
Chase Topolak, where you can physically see Chase
workshopping the motto. Oh, like scribbles on
a page. Exactly. He initially scribbles, In God
Is Our Trust, drawing directly from Francis Scott
Key's poem. Then he physically scratches out
the words is our and overwrites them with we
arriving at In God We Trust. So he's literally
editing it down in real time. Yeah. And Numismatist,
looking closely at the Mint's records, and Jace's
background note that he was likely also drawing
inspiration from the motto of Brown University
in Rhode Island. which is in Dios Paramis. Which
is Latin for in God, we hope. Exactly. OK, so
Chase edits it down to four punchy words. But
the Treasury Secretary can't just unilaterally
change the currency, right? Doesn't Congress
have to approve that kind of thing? Correct.
Chase prepares his recommendation and Congress
passes the Coinage Act of 1864 on April 22nd.
This law officially allowed the Secretary of
the Treasury to authorize the inclusion of the
phrase on one cent and two cent coins. Later
that year, The capitalized phrase, In God We
Trust, made its very first official appearance
on the bronze two -cent piece. Then the following
year, In 1865, right before Lincoln is assassinated,
Congress passes another bill allowing the motto
on all gold and silver coins that had enough
physical space for the inscription. We have this
image of the Civil War era being deeply religious,
so I'm assuming the public was thrilled to finally
have this official acknowledgement of God on
the money. We really have to be careful not to
view 19th century history through a lens of universal
consensus. Oh, so they weren't all thrilled.
Definitely not. The public reaction was highly
fractured. while many Christian newspapers were
absolutely thrilled. Though some complained the
motto actually wasn't religious enough, suggesting
alternatives like in God alone is our trust or
even God our Christ. The secular press and the
non -religious public pushed back aggressively.
Really? What kind of pushback are we talking
about? Was it a formal philosophical debate or
were people just mocking it? Honestly, it was
both. On the philosophical side, you had major
editorial boards tearing into the treasury. The
New York Times wrote a blistering critique, stating,
quote, Let us try to carry our religion such
as it is in our hearts and not in our pockets.
In our hearts, not in our pockets. That is a
great line. It is. They also pointed out the
hypocrisy of the mint initially only putting
the motto on gold and larger silver coins, sarcastically
suggesting that God seemingly only cared about
high denomination transactions. Wow. Yeah. And
the New York Illustrated News ridiculed the coins,
saying it was the first time that God has ever
been recognized on any of our counters of mammon.
Counters of mammon. Man, that is a brutal critique
of mixing wealth with theology. And I'm seeing
notes here that the general public just started
making puns about it, too. Oh, the general public
immediately started mocking it in daily commerce.
The American Journal of Numismatics suggested
that people would misread the motto as, in gold
we trust, arguing that was a much more accurate
reflection of American commerce anyway. Uh -huh.
In gold we trust. Yeah. And newspapers in the
1860s started reporting on shopkeepers putting
up signs in their windows, playing off the motto.
You would walk into a general store and see a
sign that said, in God we trust terms cash. In
God we trust terms cash. Or another one was,
in God we trust. all others are expected to pay
cash. So it basically became a 19th century meme,
in God we trust all others pay cash. Exactly.
But despite the secular pushback and the shopkeeper
jokes, the phrase obviously survived the Civil
War. By the late 19th century, it seems to evolve
from a wartime morale booster into a fairly settled
symbol of national pride. Right. But if the issue
was settled, why do we see a massive controversy
erupt in the early 20th century? I'm looking
at the notes on President Theodore Roosevelt
and his actions regarding the motto seem completely
contradictory to his public persona. What exactly
did Teddy Roosevelt do? So to understand the
1907 controversy, we have to look at Theodore
Roosevelt's aesthetic vision for the country.
In 1904, Roosevelt decided that the physical
look of American money was stale and unimpressive.
He was a man of immense energy and vision, and
he believed American coins should rival the high
-relief beauty of ancient Greek currency. So
he totally bypassed the U .S. Mint's engravers
and hired his personal friend, the renowned sculptor
Augustus Saint -Gaudens. Saint -Gaudens is a
legend. Absolute legend. So Roosevelt hires him
to completely redesign the $10 eagle and $20
double eagle gold coins. After years of delays
due to St. Goldin's failing health, the sculpture
produced a design that is still considered one
of the most beautiful coins ever struck by the
United States. But there was a catch. A huge
catch. There was a shocking omission. Roosevelt
had specifically directly instructed St. Goldin's
to leave the motto in God we trust completely
off the new coins. I am really struggling to
square that with everything I know about Theodore
Roosevelt. He was a conservative icon, a moralist,
a man who spoke frequently about righteousness.
Why on earth would he order the removal of the
national motto from the currency? Was he secretly
harboring anti -religious sentiments? Not at
all. His rationale was exactly the opposite.
Roosevelt was fiercely protecting religion. Protecting
religion by removing God from the coin. Yes.
He felt that putting the name of God on physical
money was, in his own words, dangerously close
to sacrilege. Roosevelt was deeply aware of how
money circulated in the real world. Money was
used in brothels. It was used to buy off corrupt
politicians. It was wagered in gambling dens.
It facilitated violent crime. Oh, I see where
this is going. To Roosevelt, taking a holy sentiment
and stamping it onto the ultimate instrument
of vice and world commerce was deeply irreverent.
So his argument is that money is inherently profane
and mixing the sacred name of God with the profane
transactions of daily life actually degrades
the sacred. Exactly. Did he articulate this publicly
at the time or was this just a private thought?
He articulated it very clearly when the controversy
broke. We have a letter he wrote in November
1907. defending his decision. Roosevelt stated
quote, my own feeling in the matter is due to
my very firm conviction that to put such a motto
on coins or to use it in any kindred manner not
only does no good, but does positive harm. He
goes on, any use which tends to cheapen it and
above all, any use which tends to secure it's
being treated in a spirit of levity is from every
standpoint profoundly to be regretted. Wow. He
pointed out that in all his life he had never
heard a human being speak reverently of the motto
on coins. Instead, he had heard it used hundreds
of times as an incitement to sneering and levity.
He explicitly referenced those shopkeeper cartoons,
In God We Trust for the Eight Cents. He felt
that kind of constant low -level mocking was
a daily insult to God. That is, that is incredibly
deep. And what about St. Godden's? Did the sculptor
agree with Roosevelt's theological arguments,
or did he just want the words off his art? St.
Godin's totally agreed to leave it off. But primarily
for aesthetic reasons. He felt that the mandated
lettering just cluttered up his beautiful ancient
Greek -inspired design. He wanted clean lines,
not paragraphs of text. I can definitely appreciate
the aesthetic argument. And honestly, Roosevelt's
theological argument is incredibly profound.
But did the public of 1907 actually buy the argument
that leaving God off the coin was a pro -religion
move? They absolutely did not. The backlash was
nuclear. Nuclear. When the new, incredibly beautiful,
but model -less gold coins entered circulation
in late 1907, a nationwide scandal erupted. Christian
organizations, temperance leagues, and newspapers
launched blistering attacks on the president.
They accused Roosevelt of an arrogant, premeditated
assault on the Christian faith. That escalated
quickly. The Atlantic Constitution published
a dramatic editorial essentially telling the
American people that they had to choose between
God and Roosevelt. The New York Sun even published
a satirical poem mocking his hubris. That is
a staggering level of outrage over a coin design.
Did anyone side with Roosevelt in the press?
It wasn't completely one -sided. The New York
Times, the Chicago Tribune, and some religious
publications like the Churchman actually defended
the president. They agreed with his premise that
money wasn't a sacred object and that faith didn't
need to be validated by the U .S. Mint. But I'm
guessing they were in the minority. Vastly in
the minority. The sheer volume of outrage from
the broader public and religious lobbying groups
completely stunned Roosevelt. He dug his heels
in for a bit, arguing he fully supported the
motto on public buildings and national monuments,
just not on cash. But in American politics, overwhelming
public pressure usually forces a capitulation.
So how did it get resolved? Did Congress have
to step in and override the president? Yes. Congress
recognized that this was a totally losing battle
for the administration. In 1908, they quickly
passed an act mandating the reinstatement of
the motto on all gold and silver coins. So the
beautiful coins got ruined. Well, the Mint's
chief engraver, Charles Z. Barber, who actually
had a bitter professional rivalry with St. Gaudens
anyway, hastily altered the sculptor's masterpiece
to squeeze the words back into the design. And
by 1938, subsequent legislation ensured the mandate
covered every single U .S. coin in production.
The philosophical debate there is just fascinating.
Does putting a deeply religious sentiment on
an item of daily secular commerce cheapen the
religion? Does stamping God's name on a coin
used to buy a pack of cigarettes degrade the
sacred? Roosevelt thought yes, but the public,
and ultimately the law, emphatically thought
no. Yeah, the public wanted it there. But I noticed
something interesting in the timeline here. If
the government was this comfortable mandating
the motto on coins in the 1860s and then remandating
it in 1908, why did it take almost another half
century to get it onto paper money? That is one
of the most interesting aspects of this history.
Up until the mid 20th century, In God We Trust
was strictly a numismatic phenomenon. It was
only on coins. So paper bills were completely
secular. The paper dollars, the five dollar bills,
the ten dollar bills in your wallet were entirely
secular. The shift to mandate the motto on paper
currency doesn't happen until the 1950s. And
the sources present two dueling historical theories
as to why that massive shift occurred when it
did. OK, let's break those down. What is the
traditional theory for why paper money suddenly
needed the motto in the 1950s? The most widely
accepted historical view is that the universal
mandate was a direct ideological weapon deployed
during the Cold War. Cold War history. In the
1950s, the United States was locked in an existential
global struggle with the Soviet Union. The USSR
actively promoted state atheism and implemented
strict, brutal anti -religious legislation. So
the U .S. wanted to contrast itself with that.
Exactly. In response, the U .S. government sought
to clearly, officially distinguish itself as
a moral, religious counterweight to Soviet communism.
We see this explicit justification in the legislative
record. In 1955, a Democratic representative
from Florida named Charles Edward Bennett introduced
the bill to require the motto on all banknotes.
Did Bennett explicitly mention the Soviets in
his reasoning? He did. His reasoning was unambiguous.
He argued on the floor that, quote, In these
days when imperialistic and materialistic communism
seeks to attack and destroy freedom, we should
continually look for ways to strengthen the foundations
of our freedom. For Bennett and his colleagues,
putting God on paper money wasn't just about
domestic piety. It was a literal ideological
shield against the Soviet threat. That perfectly
aligns with the context of the Red Scare and
the nuclear arms race. But I'm looking at theory
two, the one proposed by historian Kevin M. Cruz.
He basically argues the Cold War was just a smokescreen.
What is his argument? Kevin Cruz, in his work
on Christian nationalism, offers a really fascinating
alternative explanation. His view is that the
drive to expand the motto in the 1950s was actually
spearheaded by domestic conservative opposition
to Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal. The New
Deal. How does that connect to the motto? According
to Cruz, throughout the 1930s and 40s, business
leaders and conservative politicians were desperate
to roll back the secular government -heavy regulations
of the New Deal things like labor rights and
the welfare state. They found that purely economic
arguments weren't winning over the public. So
they pivoted. They pivoted hard. They successfully
campaigned to merge the ideas of free enterprise
capitalism with Christianity, creating a movement
Cruz calls Christian libertarianism. Okay, so
if I am understanding Cruz correctly, by lobbying
to make the nation officially under God, corporate
America was basically trying to frame unregulated
capitalism as a divine mandate. Positioning government
regulation is not just economically bad, but
anti -Christian. Exactly. Organizations like
Spiritual Mobilization, led by Reverend James
W. Fifield, Jr., and backed by major industrialists,
push this narrative heavily. Cruz argues that
the Cold War was just a convenient, unassailable
excuse to finalize a domestic project that had
been in the works for 20 years. They were marrying
conservative politics, corporate interests, and
public religion. Are we sure it wasn't just a
combination of both, like a domestic push for
Christian capitalism that found the perfect legislative
vehicle in the anti -communist panic of the Cold
War. The historical consensus generally acknowledges
that both forces were absolutely at play. The
ground for this was incredibly fertile because
of the tone set by the Eisenhower administration.
Dwight D. Eisenhower. Yes. Eisenhower led a government
with a deeply public religious tenor. He was
heavily influenced by prominent evangelists of
the era, most notably Billy Graham, who was advising
politicians that a religious revival was strictly
necessary to save America. There was intense
coordinated public lobbying from groups like
the American Numismatic Association and the American
Legion to expand the use of the motto. And the
momentum just snowballs from there. I see in
the notes that in 1954, In God We Trust appears
on a U .S. postage stamp for the very first time,
an eight -cent stamp featuring the Statue of
Liberty. Then, on July 11, 1955, Congress passes
the law with bipartisan support, mandating the
phrase on all paper currency. Eisenhower signs
it, and it shows up on the $1 silver certificate
in October 1957. But they didn't stop at just
money, did they? No, they took it to the absolute
highest symbolic level possible. On July 30,
1956, the 84th Congress passed a joint resolution
officially declaring In God We Trust as the singular
national motto of the United States. Wow. It
cast the House and the Senate unanimously without
a single recorded debate. Yes. It officially
replaced the de facto secular Latin motto. e
pluribus unum, which means out of many, one,
which had been used since the founding of the
country. So we go from a militia flag in 1748
to coins in the 1860s to all paper money and
the official national motto in 1956. Once it
becomes the official motto, how does that shift
the cultural battle? Because the federal government
has made its decree, but the outline shows that
the modern history of the modern is really the
story of local culture wars. How did state governments
start weaponizing or adopting this? Once the
federal government established it as the official
motto, it essentially gave a massive green light
to state legislature. to weave it into their
own local symbolism. We see a massive wave of
state -level adoption, particularly in the 21st
century. Okay, give me some examples. In 2006,
Florida passed a lawmaking in God We Trust, their
official state motto, and it is featured prominently
on their state seal and state flag. Georgia incorporated
it into their flag design in 2001. And Mississippi
has been particularly aggressive about this recently,
right? Yes. Mississippi has been at the forefront.
They added it to their state seal in 2014, with
lawmakers offering the explicit justification
that they were protecting religious freedom.
Then in 2020, during the national reckoning over
racial injustice, Mississippi faced immense pressure
to retire its old state flag, which contained
the Confederate battle emblem. Right, I remember
that. The legislature agreed to remove the Confederate
imagery, but they passed a law requiring that
any new flag design must feature the words, in
God we trust. Voters approved the new design
and it became official in 2021. That is a fascinating
trade -off, removing a symbol of the Confederacy
but legally mandating the inclusion of a religious
motto. But where this really hits the ground
for everyday families isn't just flags, it's
the school mandates. I'm seeing a massive list
of states requiring this in public classrooms.
What is driving this recent legislative push?
The wave of school mandates over the last decade
has been highly organized. As we review the sources,
a clear map emerges. Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana,
South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Virginia
have all passed laws either requiring schools
to display the motto prominently or mandating
that if a privately donated poster containing
the motto is given to a school, the school is
legally obligated to hang it up in a conspicuous
place. Legally obligated? Yes. Much of this legislation
is drafted and promoted by conservative Christian
organizations and legislative coalitions. Their
stated goal is to reintroduce historical Judeo
-Christian principles into the public sphere.
For example, in Louisiana, a 2018 law not only
mandated the display but required instruction
about the motto as part of the social studies
curriculum. It's a part of the actual teaching.
It is. A subsequent 2023 Louisiana law went even
further, requiring the motto to be hung in every
single classroom in the state. I saw something
in the notes about a school district in Kentucky
finding a very literal loophole to a similar
mandate. How did they handle the law? Oh, this
is a brilliant example of how local interpretation
shapes state mandates. In 2019, Kentucky passed
a law requiring public schools to display the
motto in a prominent location. Okay. To protest
what they viewed as a heavy -handed religious
requirement, a school district that serves Lexington
Fayette County Public Schools decided to comply
with the exact letter of the law in the most
literal way possible. What did they do? They
simply printed out oversized color copies of
the back of a $1 bill, framed them, and hung
them on the walls. Because the dollar bill already
has the national motto legally printed on it.
Exactly. Another district in Kentucky, LaRue
County, complied by using oversized images of
pennies. That is amazing. They followed the law
perfectly, avoiding any legal penalties, but
totally subverted the religious intent behind
the legislation by highlighting the secular financial
context of the phrase. It is malicious compliance
at its finest. That is incredible. And speaking
of state mandates, we have to look at the highway.
The outline mentions the license plate wars.
What is the friction point there? As of 2021,
over 20 states offer an in God we trust license
plate as either a standard or a vanity option.
In states like Florida and North Carolina, you
can choose to swap out the state nickname for
the motto. Which seems fine if it's an option.
Right, the legal friction points usually occur
when a state tries to make the motto the default,
unavoidable standard for everyone. Mississippi
did exactly this in 2019 when they approved a
new standard plate design that featured the state
seal, which naturally included In God We Trust.
So you had to get it. That meant every driver
in the state regardless of their personal beliefs,
had to carry that phrase on their car unless
they paid an extra fee for a specialty plate.
Which perfectly brings us to the final and perhaps
most complex part of our deep dive. The legal
labyrinth. Because you can't have a religious
phrase mandated on currency in public school
classrooms and on standard license plates without
running headfirst into the First Amendment of
the U .S. Constitution. Specifically, the Establishment
Clause, which prohibits the government from making
any law respecting an establishment of religion.
How does mandating this everywhere not violate
the separation of church and state? Let's clearly
define the core conflict here, maintaining our
strict impartiality. Right. On one side you have
secular, humanist, and atheist groups. Organizations
like Americans United for Separation of Church
and State, the Freedom from Religion Foundation,
and the Satanic Temple. Their legal argument
is straightforward. Right. They perceive the
motto as a direct, undeniable religious statement.
Which makes sense. They argue that by printing
In God We Trust, on currency and forcing its
display in public schools, the government is
violating the Establishment Clause, alienating
non -believers, and implicitly defining the specific
monotheistic type of God the nation supposedly
trusts. And on the other side? On the other side,
you have conservative lawmakers and advocacy
groups who actively lobby for the motto's adoption.
These proponents argue that the motto is a traditional
element of American civil religion. Civil religion.
Yes. They maintain it simply expresses the historical
will of the founders and serves as a patriotic
historical symbol rather than a purely theological
or coercive one. So you have two incredibly strong
fundamentally opposed views. Secularists say
it's an unconstitutional establishment of religion.
Proponents say it's just harmless historical
patriotism. How on earth does the judiciary handle
this? How has the motto survived decades of lawsuits
trying to scrape it off the currency? The federal
courts have relied on two primary judicial philosophies
to uphold the constitutionality of the motto.
The first is accommodationism. Accommodationism.
Yes. Yes. This legal doctrine allows the government
to acknowledge or endorse religious establishments
or sentiments as long as they are all treated
equally. The practices are not legally coercive,
meaning you aren't forced to pray or attend church
and they don't prefer one specific religious
denomination over another. Under this view. The
courts look at historical practice and essentially
conclude, this has been going on for a long time
without establishing a theocracy. So it's a permissible
accommodation of the nation's religious heritage.
OK, so accommodationism is basically saying it's
tradition, it's not hurting anyone, and it doesn't
force you into a pew. I can see how courts lean
on that. But the second legal concept you mentioned
earlier in the notes is the one that really confuses
me. Ceremonial deism. What exactly is that? Ceremonial
deism is a crucial, heavily debated legal concept.
It was originally coined in a 1984 Supreme Court
dissent by Justice William Brennan in a case
called Lynch v. Donnelly. What was that case
about? It was actually about a Christmas nativity
scene on public property. The premise of ceremonial
deism is that certain religious references, through
their constant repetitious and customary usage
over decades or centuries, actually lose their
original specific theological meaning. Wait,
really? Yes. They are stripped of their religious
connotation and become entirely secular patriotic
or ceremonial phrases. Therefore, because they
have been effectively secularized by rote repetition,
they do not violate the establishment clause.
I have to push back on the logic of ceremonial
deism. If the legal defense for keeping in God
we trust on the money is that the phrase has
been used so often that it legally loses its
religious meaning, isn't that inherently offensive
to the religion it references? It is a massive
point of contention. Right. It's basically arguing
that the phrase doesn't really mean God in a
holy sense anymore. It's just a patriotic slogan
like just do it. I can imagine that argument
absolutely infuriates the atheists who want it
removed and deeply offends the religious people
who want the motto to maintain its holy significance.
It seems like a massive legal paradox. It is
an absolute paradox and legal scholars debate
it constantly. It essentially saves the motto
by legally draining it of its sacred power. But
regardless the philosophical paradox, it has
been highly effective in the courts. Let's walk
through the legal timeline of how this defense
has been applied. The intense, moderate anxiety
over the motto really began in 1962 with a landmark
Supreme Court case called Engel v. Vital. In
that case, the Supreme Court struck down a New
York law that encouraged public schools to recite
a government -offered prayer. The court ruled
definitively that public school prayer violated
the First Amendment. I imagine the public reaction
to banning school prayer in 1962 was explosive.
It was an absolute panic. According to polling
from the era nearly 80 percent of Americans disapproved
of the ruling. Congress went into a frenzy. They
were terrified that if school prayer was deemed
unconstitutional, then in God we trust on the
currency would be the Supreme Court's very next
target. The domino effect. Exactly. Senator Sam
Ervin from North Carolina famously wondered if
God himself had been declared unconstitutional.
Some congressmen even tried to pass bills to
buy Bibles for the Supreme Court justices to
remind them of their faith. Did Congress take
any preemptive action to protect the motto? They
did. In direct physical retaliation to the court's
ruling, in December 1962, Congress ordered the
motto to be carved in massive letters directly
above the rostrum of the Speaker of the House
of Representatives. Wow, just carved right into
the stone. It was a literal stone wall of descience,
daring the courts to challenge it. And the legal
challenges from the public did inevitably come.
In 1970, we see the first major appellate case
challenging the motto on currency, Arenal v.
United States. And how did the court rule in
error now? The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
ruled against the plaintiff, relying heavily
on the concept of ceremonial deism, even before
Brennan formally coined the term. They stated
that the motto's use is of patriotic or ceremonial
character and bears no true resemblance to a
governmental sponsorship of a religious exercise.
OK. This exact logic was affirmed again in the
1970s by the Fifth Circuit and again in the 1990s
by the Tenth Circuit. It seems like every time
someone sues, the courts just copy pace the ceremonial
deism argument. I remember hearing about a guy
in the 2000s who made a career out of suing over
this, Michael Newdow. Yes, Michael Newdow. He
is a physician and an attorney who launched a
relentless crusade against government religious
phrases. He previously sued, famously, to get
the phrase, under God, removed from the Pledge
of Allegiance. Right, I remember that. Backed
by the Freedom from Religion Foundation, Newdow
filed multiple lawsuits across different federal
circuits trying to get the motto off the currency.
He sued in California in 2006, New York in 2013,
and Ohio in 2016. Every single time the federal
courts shut him down, repeating the precedent
that the motto has no theological or ritualistic
impact. Have the courts ever compared it to other
religious phrases in government, like beyond
just the pledge? Yes, a fascinating comparison
came up in a 2015 New Jersey state court ruling.
A judge named David F. Bauman was dealing with
a lawsuit about the Pledge of Allegiance, and
he wrote that expunging under God from the national
consciousness would be just as impossible as
expunging in God. we trust from every coin. Which
is pretty much impossible at this point. Or removing
the phrase, so help me God, from the presidential
oath of office. Or stopping the Supreme Court
from opening with, God save the United States
and this honorable court. The judiciary views
these phrases as an inextricably entrenched part
of the American fabric. Interestingly, the Supreme
Court itself has actually never ruled directly
on the merits of the motto's constitutionality.
Wait, really? The Supreme Court has never taken
it up. Nope. They've repeatedly denied certain
meaning. They refuse to hear appeals on all these
lower court cases, effectively letting the ceremonial
deism defense stand. Is there any exception?
If the courts are universally protecting the
motto on currency and buildings, what happened
at the license plates? You mentioned Mississippi
earlier. Yes. There is one major legal vulnerability
for the motto and it hinges on the concept of
compelled speech. Compelled speech. OK. While
the courts consistently rule that the government
can print the motto on its own currency and carve
it into its own buildings, the government cannot
force you as a private citizen to display it
on your private property. This legal precedent
goes all the way back to a 1977 Supreme Court
case called Woolley v. Maynard. What happened
in Woolley v. Maynard? New Hampshire tried to
force its citizens to carry the state motto,
live free or die, on their standard license plates.
A Jehovah's Witness objected to the phase and
covered it up, and he was repeatedly arrested.
For covering up the motto? Yes. The Supreme Court
eventually struck down the state's actions, ruling
that a state cannot force a citizen to use their
private property as a mobile billboard for the
state's ideological message. Ah, the mobile billboard.
exception. So if a coin is government property,
but my car is my private property, the state
can't make me advertise their religious or ideological
slogan. Precisely. And that exact 1977 precedent
is why a federal judge in Mississippi ruled in
2023 that the state could not force drivers to
display in God we trust on their standard default
license plates. So they won. Yes. The judge ruled
that if someone objects, they cannot be compelled
to advertise the message, regardless of whether
it's considered ceremonial deism. Mississippi
ended up running a design contest for a new standard
plate without the motto, and the atheist plaintiffs
subsequently brought their lawsuit in May of
2023. So the courts draw a very specific bright
line between government speech on government
property and compelled speech on private property.
I am curious about where the public stands on
all this today. After 160 years of this debate,
where does the culture sit? Are we still fighting
about this at the kitchen table? The polling
data is highly revealing about both the durability
of the motto and where the culture might be heading.
Back in 2003, a joint poll by USA Today, CNN
and Gallup found that 90 percent of Americans
supported the inscription on U .S. coins. 90
percent. That is near universal consensus, which
is a rarity in American polling. It really is.
And even more recently, a 2024 Real Clear Politics
poll showed that only 17 % of Americans explicitly
want the motto removed from the currency. 17
% is remarkably low, considering how intensely
this is debated in the courts. But I imagine
there's a generational divide hiding in those
numbers. There is a deep and growing divide.
We must add a layer of nuance to those broad
numbers because generational and political splits
are actively widening. A 2019 poll of college
students by College Pulse revealed a stark partisan
divide. What did it show? Only just over half
of the college students polled supported the
inclusion of the national motto on currency.
Among those who identified as Democrats, two
-thirds opposed the motto, while 94 % of Republican
students favored it. Wow. So it's totally split
down party lines for the younger generation.
Exactly. So while the broader, older public still
largely supports the motto, the younger generation
views it through a highly polarized partisan
lens. Let's bring this all together. It is truly
incredible to marvel at the journey of these
four words. It's quite a journey. We started
with a phrase born in an obscure 18th century
Pennsylvania militia flag adapted from an English
hymnal. It was popularized as a desperate morale
booster during the theological crisis of the
Civil War. a literal presidential protest from
Teddy Roosevelt, who thought it was sacrilegious.
Right. It got supercharged by Cold War anti -communism
and corporate lobbying in the 1950s. And it has
endured endless legal battles, relying on the
paradox of ceremonial deism to become an absolute
cornerstone of American civil religion. And that
term civil religion... perfectly encapsulates
what this is. It is a complex fusion of national
identity, historical To you, our listener, I
want to emphasize that every single time you
hand over a physical piece of cash or flip a
quarter, you are not just making a mundane financial
transaction. You're not. You are physically participating
in a 160 -year -old ongoing debate about the
fundamental soul and character of the United
States. You are literally holding history in
your hand. Holding history in your hand. But
I want to leave you with one final provocative
thought to mull over on your own. Something that
builds on everything we've explored today, but
pushes it into the near future. OK, let's hear
it. We are rapidly moving toward an increasingly
cashless society. We are paying with credit cards,
Apple Pay, Venmo, cryptocurrency. Physical coins
and paper bills are slowly disappearing from
our daily secular commerce. So if paper currency
and metal coins become completely obsolete in
the next few decades, what happens to the ultimate
billboard for the national motto? That is a great
question. Right. If the physical money disappears,
where does In God We Trust go next? Does it move
into the digital code of a central bank digital
currency? Or does it simply fade away as the
physical cash does? It's something to chew on
the next time you tap your phone to pay for a
coffee. It is a profound question about the intersection
of modern technology, historical tradition, and
constitutional law. It really is. Thank you so
much for joining us on this deep dive into the
history of our money and our national motto.
We hope you enjoy the facts, the stories, and
the impartial look at the history. We invite
you to explore your own sources, pull out a dollar
bill, and look at it with fresh eyes and keep
asking those great questions. Until next time.