Two questions for this list serv, both about deriving from the recent discussion of nullification, states rights, state sovereignty, and secssion.

First, the single most enduring patriotic ritual in which Virginia public school students engage today is the daily recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance.  The Pledge, of course, has its own peculiar history--but I think it is safe to say that Virginians of all political stripes, including especially those who order the days of our school children, consider the ritual invocation of the Pledge of Allegiance as a fundamental statement of American patriotism.  We recite the Pledge because by doing so, we learn and affirm a particular version of the American constitutional past.  Its not about rote recitation--or should not be, anyway.

And yet, the Pledge of Allegiance asserts an understanding of the Constitution of the United States very much at odds with that articulated by some here.  The Pledge begins, as we all know, with the following words:  "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which its stands, one nation, indivisible . . ."  This understanding reads the act of secession--correctly, in my view--as an act of treason.  By this understanding--by the explicit and self-conscious understanding of the man who wrote the pledge in the 1890s, the Civil War was, properly speaking, not the "War of Northern Aggression" but rather the "War to Preserve the Union."  

So--my two questions.  First, it seems to me that it may be useful to review the history of the commitment to this understanding of the Constitution by Virginians.  After all, Virginia was Constitutional Union country in 1860--John Bell captured the state's electoral votes in 1860.  Virginia voted for secession only with the greatest reluctance.  Its not at all clear that Virginians were all that committed to the understanding of the Constitution being asserted by contemporary nullifiers today.  So--question one:  how do we account for this prevalence of the secessionists' interpretation of the constition in 1861, given the obvious reluctance of most Virginians to accept this line of constitutional interpretation just a year earlier?

Second, it seems reasonably incontrovertible today to say that the vast majority of Virginians now recite the Pledge of Allegiance with untroubled consciences.  Those who think about its words--a minority, to be sure--do not as a consequence of thinking about it refuse to say the Pledge, for principled reasons.  Quite the contrary, most Virginians now are in fundamental accord with the understanding of the constitution articulated in the Pledge, and have no principled objection to reciting it.  Thus, at some point in the past, it seems safe to say that the secessionists' line of constitutional interpretation ceased to command the respect and allegiance of most Virginians.  When and why did this happen?

All best,
Kevin

Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
Department of History
James Madison University

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