I Pledge Allegiance...

On the heels of firemen who refuse to put out fires comes this smackdown of a lawyer's first amendment rights by none other than a judge in Mississippi.

From The Agitator...

[Attorney] Danny Lampley . . . was jailed by Chancery Court Judge Littlejohn for failing to recite the pledge of allegiance in open court today.

I’m informed that Danny rose and was respectful, but did not recite the pledge…

The order incarcerating him provides:

BE IT REMEMBERED, this date, the Court having ordered all present in the courtroom to stand and recite the Pledge of Allegience, and having found that Danny Lampley, Attorney at Law, failed and refused to do so, finds said Danny Lampley to be in criminal contempt of court.

The order states that for this, Danny Lampley “is hereby ordered to be incaraerated in that Lee County jail.” The order continues:

IT IS FURTHER ORDED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED, that Danny Lampley shall purge himself of said criminal contempt by complying with the order of this Court by standing and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in open court.

Just for the record, a few little known facts about the Pledge of Allegiance from Wikipedia...

The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist minister, a Christian socialist, and the cousin of socialist utopian novelist Edward Bellamy.

What! A socialist wrote the Pledge of Allegiance, OMG! (this is made for Jon Stewart)

From The Pledge Of Allegiance, A Revised History and Analysis, 2007, by Dr. John W. Baer...

The Society`s Declaration of Principles reflected Francis Bellamy's economic beliefs. The principles stated that economic rights and powers were gifts of God, not for the receiver's use only, but for the benefit of all. Capitalism was not based on Christian love but on a selfish individualism.

But wait, that's not all, a bit more from Wiki...

Swearing of the pledge is accompanied by a salute. An early version of the salute, adopted in 1892, was known as the Bellamy salute. It started with the hand outstretched toward the flag, palm down, and ended with the palm up (sound familiar?). Because of the similarity between the Bellamy salute and the Nazi salute, developed later, President Franklin D. Roosevelt instituted the hand-over-the-heart gesture as the salute to be rendered by civilians during the Pledge of Allegiance and the national anthem in the United States, instead of the Bellamy salute.

And still more from Wiki...

In 1951, the Knights of Columbus, the world's largest Catholic fraternal service organization, also began including the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. Over the next two years, the idea spread throughout Knights of Columbus nationwide. On August 21, 1952, the Supreme Council of the Knights of Columbus adopted a resolution urging that the change be made universal and copies of this resolution were sent to the President, the Vice President and the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

To sum up, the Pledge of Allegiance was created by a socialist who used a hand salute similar to the soon to come Nazi salute and the words "under God" were added at the prompting of a Catholic fraternal organization.

If that isn't enough to make Teapartiers more bat guano crazy than they already are I don't know what is...but of course that won't happen.