Francis Bellamy
Encyclopedia
Francis Julius Bellamy was an author, editor, and Baptist minister born in Mount Morris, New York
. He attended Rome Free Academy in Rome, New York
, the University of Rochester
(1872–1876) and the Rochester Theological Seminary (1876–1880). He was an American
Baptist
minister and Christian Socialist
who wrote the original Pledge of Allegiance
in 1892. It was published in the Youth's Companion
, which was a nationally circulated magazine for adolescents, and by 1892 was the largest publication of any type in the United States, with a circulation around 500,000. His cousin Edward Bellamy
is the noted author of the socialist utopia
n novels Looking Backward
(1888) and Equality (1897). Bellamy is buried in Rome, New York
.
to public schools as a premium to solicit subscriptions. For Upham and Bellamy, the flag promotion was more than merely a business move; under their influence, the Youth's Companion became a fervent supporter of the schoolhouse flag movement, which aimed to place a flag above every school in the nation. By 1892, the magazine had sold American flags to approximately 26,000 schools. By this time the market was slowing for flags, but was not yet saturated.
The previous year, Upham had the idea of using the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus
reaching the Americas
to further bolster the schoolhouse flag movement. The magazine called for a national Columbian Public School Celebration to coincide with the World's Columbian Exposition
. A flag salute was to be part of the official program for the Columbus Day
celebration to be held in schools all over America.
The Pledge was published in the September 8, 1892, issue of the magazine, and immediately put to use in the campaign. Bellamy went to speak to a national meeting of school superintendents
to promote the celebration; the convention liked the idea and selected a committee of leading educators to implement the program, including the immediate past president of the National Education Association. Bellamy was selected as the chair. Having received the official blessing of educators, Bellamy's committee now had the task of spreading the word across the nation and of designing an official program for schools to follow on the day of national celebration. He structured the program around a flag raising ceremony and his pledge.
His original Pledge read as follows:
The recital was accompanied with a salute to the flag known as the Bellamy salute
, described in detail by Bellamy. During World War II
, the salute was replaced with a hand-over-heart gesture because the original form involved stretching the arm out towards the flag in a manner that resembled the later Nazi salute
. (For a history of the pledge, see Pledge of Allegiance
).
In 1954, in response to the perceived threat of secular Communism, President Eisenhower encouraged Congress to add the words "under God," creating the 31-word pledge that is recited today.
Bellamy commented on his thoughts as he created the pledge, and his reasons for choosing the careful wording:
Bellamy "viewed his Pledge as an 'inoculation
' that would protect immigrants and native-born but insufficiently patriotic
Americans from the 'virus
' of radicalism and subversion."
who "championed 'the rights of working people and the equal distribution of economic resources, which he believed was inherent in the teachings of Jesus
.'" but he was forced to leave his Boston church the previous year because of the socialist bent of his sermons.
Bellamy's views on immigration
and universal suffrage
were somewhat less egalitarian. He wrote that "[a] democracy
like ours cannot afford to throw itself open to the world where every man is a lawmaker, every dull-witted or fanatical immigrant admitted to our citizenship
is a bane to the commonwealth; where all classes of society merge insensibly into one another.”
Mount Morris, New York
Mount Morris, New York refers to:*Mount Morris , New York*Mount Morris , New York*Marcus Garvey Park, also called Mount Morris Park, in Harlem, New York*Mount Morris Park Historic District, the area surrounding Marcus Garvey Park...
. He attended Rome Free Academy in Rome, New York
Rome, New York
Rome is a city in Oneida County, New York, United States. It is located in north-central or "upstate" New York. The population was 44,797 at the 2010 census. It is in New York's 24th congressional district. In 1758, British forces began construction of Fort Stanwix at this strategic location, but...
, the University of Rochester
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester is a private, nonsectarian, research university in Rochester, New York, United States. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees. The university has six schools and various interdisciplinary programs.The...
(1872–1876) and the Rochester Theological Seminary (1876–1880). He was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
minister and Christian Socialist
Christian socialism
Christian socialism generally refers to those on the Christian left whose politics are both Christian and socialist and who see these two philosophies as being interrelated. This category can include Liberation theology and the doctrine of the social gospel...
who wrote the original Pledge of Allegiance
Pledge of Allegiance
The Pledge of Allegiance of the United States is an expression of loyalty to the federal flag and the republic of the United States of America, originally composed by Christian Socialist Francis Bellamy in 1892 and formally adopted by Congress as the pledge in 1942...
in 1892. It was published in the Youth's Companion
Youth's Companion
The Youth's Companion , known in later years as simply The Companion—For All the Family, was an American children's magazine that existed for over one hundred years until it finally merged with The American Boy in 1929...
, which was a nationally circulated magazine for adolescents, and by 1892 was the largest publication of any type in the United States, with a circulation around 500,000. His cousin Edward Bellamy
Edward Bellamy
Edward Bellamy was an American author and socialist, most famous for his utopian novel, Looking Backward, set in the year 2000. He was a very influential writer during the Gilded Age of United States history.-Early life:...
is the noted author of the socialist utopia
Utopia
Utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt...
n novels Looking Backward
Looking Backward
Looking Backward: 2000-1887 is a utopian science fiction novel by Edward Bellamy, a lawyer and writer from western Massachusetts; it was first published in 1887...
(1888) and Equality (1897). Bellamy is buried in Rome, New York
Rome, New York
Rome is a city in Oneida County, New York, United States. It is located in north-central or "upstate" New York. The population was 44,797 at the 2010 census. It is in New York's 24th congressional district. In 1758, British forces began construction of Fort Stanwix at this strategic location, but...
.
The Pledge
In 1891, Daniel Sharp Ford, the owner of the Youth's Companion, hired Bellamy to work with Ford's nephew James B. Upham in the magazine's premium department. In 1888, the Youth's Companion had begun a campaign to sell American flagsFlag of the United States
The national flag of the United States of America consists of thirteen equal horizontal stripes of red alternating with white, with a blue rectangle in the canton bearing fifty small, white, five-pointed stars arranged in nine offset horizontal rows of six stars alternating with rows...
to public schools as a premium to solicit subscriptions. For Upham and Bellamy, the flag promotion was more than merely a business move; under their influence, the Youth's Companion became a fervent supporter of the schoolhouse flag movement, which aimed to place a flag above every school in the nation. By 1892, the magazine had sold American flags to approximately 26,000 schools. By this time the market was slowing for flags, but was not yet saturated.
The previous year, Upham had the idea of using the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
reaching the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...
to further bolster the schoolhouse flag movement. The magazine called for a national Columbian Public School Celebration to coincide with the World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition
The World's Columbian Exposition was a World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. Chicago bested New York City; Washington, D.C.; and St...
. A flag salute was to be part of the official program for the Columbus Day
Columbus Day
Many countries in the New World and elsewhere celebrate the anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the Americas, which occurred on October 12, 1492, as an official holiday...
celebration to be held in schools all over America.
The Pledge was published in the September 8, 1892, issue of the magazine, and immediately put to use in the campaign. Bellamy went to speak to a national meeting of school superintendents
Superintendent (education)
In education in the United States, a superintendent is an individual who has executive oversight and administration rights, usually within an educational entity or organization....
to promote the celebration; the convention liked the idea and selected a committee of leading educators to implement the program, including the immediate past president of the National Education Association. Bellamy was selected as the chair. Having received the official blessing of educators, Bellamy's committee now had the task of spreading the word across the nation and of designing an official program for schools to follow on the day of national celebration. He structured the program around a flag raising ceremony and his pledge.
His original Pledge read as follows:
- "I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to* the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all"
- (* 'to' added in October 1892).
The recital was accompanied with a salute to the flag known as the Bellamy salute
Bellamy salute
The Bellamy salute is the salute described by Francis Bellamy to accompany the American Pledge of Allegiance, which he had authored. During the period when it was used with the Pledge of Allegiance, it was sometimes known as the "flag salute"...
, described in detail by Bellamy. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the salute was replaced with a hand-over-heart gesture because the original form involved stretching the arm out towards the flag in a manner that resembled the later Nazi salute
Nazi salute
The Nazi salute, or Hitler salute , was a gesture of greeting in Nazi Germany usually accompanied by saying, Heil Hitler! ["Hail Hitler!"], Heil, mein Führer ["Hail, my leader!"], or Sieg Heil! ["Hail victory!"]...
. (For a history of the pledge, see Pledge of Allegiance
Pledge of Allegiance
The Pledge of Allegiance of the United States is an expression of loyalty to the federal flag and the republic of the United States of America, originally composed by Christian Socialist Francis Bellamy in 1892 and formally adopted by Congress as the pledge in 1942...
).
In 1954, in response to the perceived threat of secular Communism, President Eisenhower encouraged Congress to add the words "under God," creating the 31-word pledge that is recited today.
Bellamy commented on his thoughts as he created the pledge, and his reasons for choosing the careful wording:
- "It began as an intensive communing with salient points of our national history, from the Declaration of IndependenceUnited States Declaration of IndependenceThe Declaration of Independence was a statement adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, which announced that the thirteen American colonies then at war with Great Britain regarded themselves as independent states, and no longer a part of the British Empire. John Adams put forth a...
onwards; with the makings of the Constitution... with the meaning of the Civil WarAmerican Civil WarThe American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
; with the aspiration of the people... - "The true reason for allegiance to the Flag is the 'republicRepublicA republic is a form of government in which the people, or some significant portion of them, have supreme control over the government and where offices of state are elected or chosen by elected people. In modern times, a common simplified definition of a republic is a government where the head of...
for which it stands'. ...And what does that last thing, the Republic mean? It is the concise political word for the Nation - the One Nation which the Civil War was fought to prove. To make that One Nation idea clear, we must specify that it is indivisible, as WebsterDaniel WebsterDaniel Webster was a leading American statesman and senator from Massachusetts during the period leading up to the Civil War. He first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests...
and LincolnAbraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
used to repeat in their great speeches. And its future? - "Just here arose the temptation of the historic slogan of the French RevolutionFrench RevolutionThe French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
which meant so much to JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
and his friends, 'Liberty, equality, fraternityLiberté, égalité, fraternitéLiberté, égalité, fraternité, French for "Liberty, equality, fraternity ", is the national motto of France, and is a typical example of a tripartite motto. Although it finds its origins in the French Revolution, it was then only one motto among others and was not institutionalized until the Third...
'. No, that would be too fanciful, too many thousands of years off in realization. But we as a nation do stand square on the doctrine of liberty and justice for all..."
Bellamy "viewed his Pledge as an 'inoculation
Inoculation
Inoculation is the placement of something that will grow or reproduce, and is most commonly used in respect of the introduction of a serum, vaccine, or antigenic substance into the body of a human or animal, especially to produce or boost immunity to a specific disease...
' that would protect immigrants and native-born but insufficiently patriotic
Patriotism
Patriotism is a devotion to one's country, excluding differences caused by the dependencies of the term's meaning upon context, geography and philosophy...
Americans from the 'virus
Virus
A virus is a small infectious agent that can replicate only inside the living cells of organisms. Viruses infect all types of organisms, from animals and plants to bacteria and archaea...
' of radicalism and subversion."
Political views
Bellamy was a Christian SocialistChristian socialism
Christian socialism generally refers to those on the Christian left whose politics are both Christian and socialist and who see these two philosophies as being interrelated. This category can include Liberation theology and the doctrine of the social gospel...
who "championed 'the rights of working people and the equal distribution of economic resources, which he believed was inherent in the teachings of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
.'" but he was forced to leave his Boston church the previous year because of the socialist bent of his sermons.
Bellamy's views on immigration
Immigration
Immigration is the act of foreigners passing or coming into a country for the purpose of permanent residence...
and universal suffrage
Universal suffrage
Universal suffrage consists of the extension of the right to vote to adult citizens as a whole, though it may also mean extending said right to minors and non-citizens...
were somewhat less egalitarian. He wrote that "[a] democracy
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
like ours cannot afford to throw itself open to the world where every man is a lawmaker, every dull-witted or fanatical immigrant admitted to our citizenship
Citizenship
Citizenship is the state of being a citizen of a particular social, political, national, or human resource community. Citizenship status, under social contract theory, carries with it both rights and responsibilities...
is a bane to the commonwealth; where all classes of society merge insensibly into one another.”