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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A number of atheists and non-religious organizations want Barack Obama's inauguration ceremony to leave out all references to God and religion. President-elect Barack Obama will use the Bible Abraham Lincoln used for his inauguration. In a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Washington, the plaintiffs demand that the words "so help me God" not be added to the end of the president's oath of office. In addition, the lawsuit objects to plans for ministers to deliver an invocation and a benediction in which they may discuss God and religion. An advance copy of the lawsuit was posted online by...

Excerpt - In what police describe as a "probable" suicide leap, a prominent Monterey Bay Area attorney fell at least nine floors to his death at the Embassy Suites Hotel Monterey Bay in Seaside the morning before Christmas. Shortly before 9:30 a.m. Sunday, officers found the body of Aptos attorney Paul Sanford in the west end of the hotel lobby, where he had landed on a large ventilation grate. Police Capt. Steve Cercone said horrified guests were eating breakfast in the atrium at the time, and a number of witnesses saw Sanford fall from somewhere between the 9th and 12th...

It may be illegal for school children to say the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, Rep. Todd Akin, R-MO, dreads. Akin fears what he calls activist judges and their ability to legislate what the American people don’t want. He spoke to the 13th Eagle Forum Collegians Annual Leadership Summit about two bills he supports designed to rein in activist judges who legislate from the bench. The Pledge Protection Act of 2005 received a 247-173 House vote in 2005, but died in the Senate. In reaction to a 2003 decision by the 9th U.S....

A federal judge on Monday rejected a lawsuit from an atheist who said the use of "In God We Trust" on U.S. coins violated his First Amendment rights. U.S. District Judge Frank C. Damrell Jr. said the minted words amounted to a secular national slogan that did not trample on Michael Newdow's religious views. "There is no proper allegation that the government compelled plaintiff to affirm a repugnant belief in monotheism," Damrell said in dismissing the suit. Newdow, a Sacramento doctor and lawyer, also lost an effort two years ago to have the Pledge of Allegiance banned from public schools...

MATTHEWS, N.C. -- Two twin girls were stabbed to death Friday at their home on Creek Pointe Drive, police said. The father of the 5-year-olds, David Lauren Crespi, [has been charged with murdering them. Medic reported that Crespi, 45, called 911 at 12:45 p.m., saying he fatally stabbed his daughters. He also threatened to kill himself, Medic said. When police arrived at the scene, Crespi was waiting for them outside the home. The children were inside, and there was nothing paramedics could do to save them. Officials couldn’t come up with an immediate explanation. “We’re not anywhere where we can...

We all knew it was coming and here it is. Michael Newdow’s has officially announced his most recent attempt to remove God from the public square. Read More... Craig DeLuz Visit The Home of Uncommon Sense... www.craigdeluz.com

Michael Newdow, perhaps America's best known atheist, has a new target in his personal war against God in the public culture: "In God We Trust" on U.S. money. "I am about to file to get 'In God We Trust' off the front of our currency," he told the Oklahoman. "I plan to do that this week."

SACRAMENTO, Calif. The atheist who's spent years trying to ban recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools says he'll file a new lawsuit this week. Michael Newdow says he'll ask a federal court to order removal of the national motto "In God We Trust" from U-S coins and currency. He says it violates the religious rights of atheists who belong to his "First Amendment Church of True Science." The church's "three suggestions" are "question, be honest and do what's right." Newdow says it wouldn't be right to take up a collection when the money says "In God We...

Like the slime-creature from a '50s science-fiction film (“Kill it, before it multiplies!”), federal judges are seemingly unstoppable – a malignant, mutating entity determined to conquer the planet. Which is another way of saying that another activist judge has decided that God is unconstitutional. Judge Lawrence K. Karlton (not surprisingly, a Carter-nominee) based his opinion on a fiction – which, come to think of it, isn’t surprising, either. Karlton said he was bound by precedent to find that recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance with the words “one nation under God” violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. The precedent Karlton...

What was it about the World Trade Center that attracted Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida killers – not once but twice? And why attack the Pentagon? And why was one of the skyjacked planes headed toward another Washington target, possibly the White House or the Capitol Building? Why? Because they're more than inviting targets; they're highly visible symbols of American life. They represent free enterprise and our successful commerce throughout the world; they represent our supreme military might; and they represent our free democratic government, the envy – and fear – of the rest of the world. Some of...

WASHINGTON - The atheist who tried to remove "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to bar the saying of a prayer at President Bush's inauguration. In an emergency filing, Michael Newdow argued that a prayer at Thursday's ceremony would violate the Constitution by forcing him to accept unwanted religious beliefs. His request has been rejected by two lower courts. Newdow also asked that Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who is designated as the justice to hear emergency appeals for the D.C. Circuit, recuse himself because he is scheduled to swear in Bush and...

Atheist Challenges Inaugural Prayers By Carol D. Leonnig Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, January 14, 2005; Page B01 A California atheist asked a federal judge yesterday to stop President Bush from having two Protestant ministers say prayers at the inauguration, arguing that it would violate his constitutional rights to the separation of church and state. Michael Newdow, a lawyer and doctor who has fought to keep his daughter from being exposed to the Pledge of Allegiance in her public school, said the inauguration is perhaps the most public of all government-sponsored national ceremonies. It should not provide the president with...

This afternoon at 3:30 at the U.S. District Court in Washington, DC, oral arguments will take place in the Inauguration Prayer case. Dr. Michael Newdow has brought a challenge against President Bush in order to stop ministers from giving an invocation and benediction at the Inaugural swearing-in ceremony which will take place on Thursday, January 20th. All briefs in the case were filed on Friday. Senior Counsel Jim Henderson from our Washington, DC office will be in court on Thursday, and we will have frequent updates on our website starting this evening. We anticipate a very quick decision in the...

The California lawyer who tried to have the phrase "under God" removed from the Pledge of Allegiance now wants to legally prevent President Bush from placing his hand on a Bible while being sworn in at his inauguration. Michael Newdow, an atheist doctor and lawyer from Sacramento, has filed a complaint and a motion for preliminary injunction in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking to remove prayer and all "Christian religious acts" from the Jan. 20 inauguration. Mr. Newdow, 50, asserts that the presence of Christian ministers who pray publicly at the inauguration, Christian songs and the...

Atheist sues to prevent prayer at Bush inauguration The Associated Press (Updated Thursday, January 6, 2005, 4:45 PM) SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - An atheist who sued because he did not want his young daughter exposed to the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance is now filing a suit to bar the saying of a prayer at President Bush's inauguration. Michael Newdow, of Sacramento, notes that two ministers, the Reverend Franklin Graham and the Reverend Kirbyjon Caldwell, delivered Christian invocations at Bush's first inaugural ceremony in 2001.

<p>The battle over the Pledge of Allegiance has stimulated vigorous controversy on an issue central to America's identity.</p> <p>Opponents of "under God" (which was added to the pledge in 1954) argue that the United States is a secular country, that the First Amendment prohibits rhetorical or material state support for religion, and that people should be able to pledge allegiance to their country without implicitly also affirming a belief in God.</p>

Bush Country just received a rather disturbing email from one of our regular site visitors, Reverend Austin Miles.  In it, Rev Miles discloses that Michael Newdow (the atheist behind the Pledge of Allegiance lawsuit) is now a member of the State Bar of California and is apparently using that authority as an officer of the court to not only further his atheistic agenda but to harass Christians as well. Bush Country ask that you forward this information to major media outlets and those on your email list, so they can report on what is going on. Here are the...

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to decide whether it's unconstitutional for children in public schools to pledge their allegiance to "one nation under God." The Pledge of Allegiance case pushes the court into an emotional argument over religion, patriotism and schools. Activists on both sides of the church-state divide immediately predicted one of the most significant, and wrenching, rulings in the court's modern history. Generations of schoolchildren have begun each day by standing, hand on heart, to recite the oath that begins, "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America." Sometime next year, the...

I don’t know how many times it has been said but I am sure it is quite a lot. The assertion that the United States Constitution has verbiage specifically providing for a separation of church and state is a false one. At no time has there ever been any mention of the separation of church and state in the US Constitution. There was never even any discussion by the Framers of the Constitution to put verbiage in the Constitution regarding the separation of church and state. What the United States Constitution states in the First Amendment is, and I quote:...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The California schoolgirl whose father sparked a major court battle against the Pledge of Alliance has actually been saying it even though she could opt out of the daily ritual, a school official said on Thursday.Michael Newdow, an atheist whose 8-year-old daughter attends a school in the city of Elk Grove near Sacramento in Northern California, sued because of the pledge's reference to one nation `` under God.''The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals then held the pledge should be banned because the phrase ``one nation under God'' violated the constitutional requirement on church-state separation. The issue...

<p>In real time, world Islam may be in the 21st century, but in practice, it's closer to the Dark Ages, panelists said at a forum yesterday.</p> <p>"The theory and practice of jihad was not concocted in the Pentagon," said Ibn Warraq, a speaker at the conference on Islam sponsored by the Council for Secular Humanism at the Capitol Hilton. "It was taken from the Koran, the Hadith [additional sayings of Muhammad] and Islamic tradition. Western liberals, especially humanists, find it hard to believe this. The trouble with Western liberals is they are pathologically nice. They think that everyone thinks like them, including the Islamic fundamentalists.</p>

NBC4.TV/NewsMan Who Filed Pledge Lawsuit Appealing Case Against President Bush Newdow Also In Court With Wife POSTED: 9:11 a.m. PDT July 16, 2002 SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- The Sacramento man who challenged the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance is now appealing the dismissal of another religious lawsuit. Michael Newdow is seeking to bar references to God at presidential inaugurations. That case, Newdow v. Bush, is one of three First Amendment-related lawsuits he has in the courts. One includes the Pledge of Allegiance suit in which he claimed the phrase "under God" violates the Constitution's separation of church and...

Newdow is NOT an athiest. He is a PRACTICING Jew according to his child's mother per ED on Fox & Friends according to Rita Cosby's report interviewing Newdow's daughter's mother(they have never been married). He has always been "interested" in contitutional law is the reason given for taking this to court. Isn't THAT SPECIAL?!

Judge Not By George Neumayr Should the people who believe the least define the most about America's public life? Yes, says the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Its 2-1 ruling against the Pledge of Allegiance is a stunning victory for a minority of malcontents determined to create a nation under nothing. "This is more about me than her," said Michael Newdow, the Sacramento atheist who brought the lawsuit against the Pledge of Allegiance on behalf of his daughter. "Newdow acknowledged that he is, in effect, using his daughter to support his cause," reports the Los Angeles Times. "He said...