MOTION TO RECUSE ALL SUPREME COURT JUSTICESMotion to Recuse all Supreme Court Justices in Pledge of Allegiance case


A Motion for recusal of for the first time in history addressed every Justice on the the U.S. Supreme Court, and helped to educate them and the legal community and judges worldwide, about the true history of the pledge of allegiance.




Support the "STOP THE PLEDGE" Campaign and support historical and educational research about the Pledge, its author and his ilk. 

Eye-popping, jaw-dropping photographs are at http://rexcurry.net/pledge2.html
Amazing articles shredding the totalitarian pledge are at http://rexcurry.net/pledge1.html
A pdf version of the entire Wonschik amicus brief exposing the Pledge of Allegiance is at http://rexcurry.net/pledgewonschik.pdf
The brief of the NACDL - National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers http://rexcurry.net/pledgenacdl.html
Track the progress of the Wonschik case in the Supreme Court docket at http://www.supremecourtus.gov/docket/03-10249.htm
Complaints were filed against two Judges who led jurors in chants in California.  http://rexcurry.net/pledgecomplaints.html
This is a lawsuit to stop the Pledge of Allegiance in court http://rexcurry.net/pledgelawsuit.html
And see Postcards exposing the original Pledge of Allegiance at http://www.cafeshops.com/rexy.9216669
And see photographic images etc at http://stores.ebay.com/Rex-Curry

The arguments explained that many older Americans performed the Pledge of Allegiance with its original straight-arm salute every day for the first twelve years of their formal educations in government schools.  The Pledge of Allegiance was the origin of the salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party.  Many Americans were forced to chant the Pledge by law, under threat of expulsion and eventual arrest and jail.  Many older Americans were aware that the Pledge of Allegiance was written by a self-proclaimed National Socialist in the U.S. (Francis Bellamy) who promoted a government education monopoly because he wanted to create an “industrial army” (a Bellamy term) modeled on the military for a totalitarian society of Christian socialism.  Francis Bellamy and his cousin Edward Bellamy promoted their ideas worldwide and they influenced similar behavior in socialists in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the Peoples’ Republic of China, and the National Socialist German Workers’ Party.  Many older Americans attended racist government schools where segregation was imposed by law and where racism was taught by government teachers.    It was behavior that was later shared by the National Socialist German Workers' Party.  Many Americans lived before WWII and knew the history of the Pledge and liked it. Some may have liked it even after WWII. 

Here is a quote from an Associated Press (AP) story: "Rex Curry argues that justices might be biased if they participated in 'schools that had a daily robotic chanting on cue from the government.'"  A Google News search (in addition to a regular search) for "Frank Herbert Wonschik" provided more examples at the height of the news coverage (and select the tab that reads "repeat the search with omitted results included").

Some jurors and judges chanted the pledge every day in government schools at the ring of a bell like Pavlov's lapdogs of the state.

It did not turn every judge and juror into a Manchurian candidate. But that was not the legal and ethical test in this case.

THE MOTION

Undersigned Counsel respectfully files this suggestion of recusal in this case.  

BACKGROUND
    This motion adopts the same arguments that resulted in the recusal of a single Justice in the case of Elk Grove Unified School Dist. v. Newdow, 124 S. Ct. 2301; 159 L. Ed. 2d 98; 2004 U.S. LEXIS 4178; 72 U.S.L.W. 4457;17 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 359 (U.S. June 14, 2004).  This motion also adds additional arguments.
    Fifty years after its debut in 1892, the Pledge of Allegiance was codified by the Congress of the United States. Pub. L. No. 623, Ch. 435, § 7, 56 Stat. 380 (1942) (codified at 36 U.S.C. § 172). At that time, the Pledge contained no explicit religious verbiage.  Nevertheless it raised many concerns including religion clause concerns. Minersville School Board v. Gobitis,  310 U.S. 586 (1940).   The original article in which the Pledge debuted is replete with religious references (Youth's Companion, September 8, 1892, and also see the article therein "The Meaning of the Four Centuries").  The pledge's author, Francis Bellamy, was a preacher, a member of the Society of Christian Socialists, and is said to have been expelled from the ministry for giving speeches such as "Jesus the Socialist" (finding a copy of that speech is harder than finding photos of the original salute to the flag).   It seems like an oversight that the phrase "under God" was not in the original pledge. In that sense, there is no "secular" Pledge of Allegiance and there never was. The purpose of the pledge was to promote a government takeover of education, and to eliminate all of the better alternatives, in order to create an “industrial army” openly modeled on the military to establish a utopian society of Christian socialism.  The pledge was a prayer for a utopian society of Christian socialism even before it was explicitly deified in 1954.  Bellamy’s ideas were dystopian hell here and abroad.
    In 1954, Section 172 was amended so that the words “under God” were added. Pub. L. No. 396, Ch. 297, 68 Stat. 249 (1954), in an arguable further violation of the Establishment Clause. In 1998, Title 36 was revised (Pub. L. No. 105-225, § 2(a), 112 Stat. 1494 (1998)) and Section 172 removed.  Accordingly, the Pledge is now found at 4 U.S.C. § 4 .
    Bellamy was not a beautiful friend of freedom.  In addition to proclaiming bizarre religious goals, the Pledge’s author was a self-proclaimed national socialist and the original Pledge used a straight-armed salute. It was the origin of the salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party.
    Some of the justices in this case were old enough to have performed the Pledge using its original Nazi-style salute.
    Some of the justices in this case were old enough to have performed the Pledge of Allegiance under compulsion of law. In Minersville School Board v. Gobitis,  310 U.S. 586 (1940) the Supreme Court ruled that a government school could expel a child and eventually arrest the child and his parents if the child persisted in refusing to salute the flag (Hereafter Gobitas, in that "Gobitis" was a misspelling). Three years later (1943), in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943), the Supreme Court reversed itself and decided that school children may not be forced to stand and salute the flag.  Nevertheless, various states attempted to compel or promote the pledge by law thereafter.
    On March 8, 2000, the Newdow case began in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California, challenging the constitutionality of the Pledge and seeking to have the words, "under God," removed. Comments about the litigation showed the stereotypical ignorance and/or silence about the frightening history of the Pledge.
    A firestorm of controversy has surrounded litigation about the Pledge of Allegiance.  The reaction is clearly the result of the conflicts that government institutions cause between people who would otherwise be free.  The associated passions – though understandable – are the very reason we need freedom, and, perhaps in this arena more than any other, it is essential that the judiciary present a neutral front. To be sure, the individual judges and justices may be assumed to hold fervid political and religious beliefs. However, those beliefs – whatever form they take – cannot give the appearance of a bias which might interfere with impartial legal analysis. Because some facts about the justice's biographies and activities have called that impartiality into question, recusal by one, some or all of the Justices is indicated.

LEGAL STANDARD
    28 U.S.C. § 455 (a) states, "Any justice, judge, or magistrate [magistrate judge] of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned." For the reasons that follow, the impartiality of some or all Justices "might reasonably be questioned" in the case at bar.

JUSTICE'S BACKGROUNDS AND ACTIVITIES
    This case presents the highest court with a chance to liberate Americans from the Pledge of Allegiance led by government officials in government functions and in government schools, and this case could begin the end of government schools.
    This suggestion of recusal is based on the same argument that is made by Wonschik in his Petition for Writ of Certiorari:  That jurors and judges are biased or appear so when they chant the "Pledge of Allegiance" especially in a federal case with a defendant/appellant/petitioner facing criminal charges, and that it prejudices the proceedings against defendants. 
    That same argument suggests that judges/justices hearing the same defendant's appeal would be biased or appear so if they chanted the Pledge at public oral arguments.
    It is counsel's understanding that the U.S. Supreme Court does not recite the Pledge at public hearings and the Court is commended.   If the Justices began their Court sessions with the Pledge of Allegiance it would not appear impartial.  Wonschik’s trial judge led jurors in a Pledge and it did not seem impartial. It is hoped that if oral arguments occur in this case, that they will not begin with the Pledge (and especially not with the original salute).
    If Congress passed a law (similar to some state school laws) requiring someone to try to lead the courtroom and justices in the Pledge, then it is hoped that everyone would declare his/her independence and personally nullify the law by sitting.  There would be the appearance of partiality if the Court did exactly what the jurors were cowed into doing in this case.
    Barnette explains that the Gobitas decision prompted West Virginia (and probably other places) to mandate the Pledge.   Barnette is a warning that if the Court does not disapprove courtroom pledges (or even if the court takes no action in this case), it may inspire laws for leading daily jury and judge pledges in courtrooms everywhere, perhaps even in federal courts including the United States Supreme Court.  
    That said, some justices may have said the pledge under mandate of law and with the original salute, in the past.  They may have done so for the most formative years of their lives, the first twelve years of their formal educations.    
    Any criminal defendant has to worry about the following types of jurors or judges:
    1. Those who were complete ignoramuses about the Pledge when they chanted it, and only heard  "benign" propaganda taught by government schools and repeated by the media.
    2. Those who were aware of the horrid history of the Pledge, yet, somehow as children mentally rejected socialism each time they chanted the socialist's Pledge, with or without the straight-arm salute, under threat of expulsion (and future arrest) in government schools.   
    3. Those who were aware of the history of the Pledge and liked it, and wanted government schools to produce Bellamy’s "industrial army" (a Bellamy term) of Christian socialism, and looked longingly at the rise of other socialists who adopted a similar straight-armed salute.   Fear of category # 3 is not an absurd fear, in that the National Socialist German Workers' Party had been in existence since 1920 (with electoral breakthroughs in 1930 and dictatorship in 1933, and WWII in 1939 with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics as its ally invading Poland).  Many Americans supported the National Socialist German Workers Party at some time and probably admired the fact that they had the same salute and were “national socialists” like the author of the Pledge.  It would be fascinating to know what Francis Bellamy thought about the National Socialist German Workers' Party before he died in 1931.   
    4. Those who STILL think as in # 3 above and who might even "restore the pledge" to its original salute.
    Every defendant must worry about jurors, judges and justices described above and even moreso when a trial begins with the Pledge.
    When a socialist says "liberty and justice for all," he means the opposite of everyone else.  When a totalitarian socialist says “equality” and "liberty and justice for all" he is telling you that he wants to rob, enslave, and kill you.
    The Pledge of Allegiance is an example of how close the U.S. came (and is still coming) to socialism and the National Socialist German Workers' Party.  (See “The Ominous Parallels” by Leonard Peikoff, 1982 Meridian).    
    Most adults who chanted the Pledge as children in Government Indoctrination Centers (GICs) did so for twelve years and then immediately stopped after being freed.   Thereafter, they only chant the pledge when led by government officials or peer pressure.
    Even those who yell the loudest about their love for the pledge only repeat it when led by government officials or group leaders. It is unlikely that jurors in Wonschik’s case start each morning by gathering with neighbors to chant the pledge, even if they did so daily for 12 years of their youth.  The jurors in this case only did so because a government official coerced them into it.  That highlights the pro-government bias of the socialist's pledge.
    The bias that the pledge creates is compounded by the fact that jurors are forced by government process to appear in court, and they can be held in contempt and jailed for refusing jury duty.   The jurors know that judges have the power of contempt and jail, but jurors may not know the judge's limits regarding a refusal to pledge.  Some Judges may not know their own limits and biases.  If judge/juror pledges are not stopped, then judges should be instructed to advise jurors that they do not have to participate and that it is not part of the jury voir dire proceeding.   Jurors (and defendants) might also be invited to bring in other flags, graven images, crests, etc., and chant other pledges, prayers and oaths etc.  Another alternative is to make jury duty voluntary and allow jurors to leave.
    Wonschik's jurors chanted the pledge before they had been selected.  If juror/judge/justice pledges are not stopped, but spread, then it is hoped that jurors/judges/justices will have the intestinal fortitude to refuse.
    Jurors who don't chant will be stricken by the prosecution because they failed their school training and must be given a grade of "F" and expelled, just like the Gobitas kids, Jehovah's witnesses and others. Refusing to group chant will be interpreted as an indication that the juror would not "go along" with the government, that the juror would "think for himself," that the juror was not "socialized" enough by government schools, or worse, went to a non-government school.  Similar thoughts will occur against judges who do not chant.  Prosecutors will voir dire and humiliate jurors about why they will not chant with the others.  
    By the time most judges and jurors enter the courtroom, the government schools have already created a pro-pledge, pro-government partiality. Jurors show that they have been whipped at the front door of the courthouse. It is rare if any juror has ever refused the assembly line search at federal courthouses (including the U.S. Supreme Court) where they abandon their Fourth Amendment rights.  It is so offensive that many judges are exempted or exempt themselves.  A juror never says "though I may be compelled to serve as a juror, I am not compelled to waive my right against unreasonable searches and seizures."  No judge ever said it for a juror, either. Government schools leave jurors uneducated about their rights, so the thought would not enter the head of any juror.  It is more evidence of the need to end the Pledge and government schools.
    That government schools and their Pledge still exist is proof of their bias and of their failure: Government schools failed to teach students (past students) to take care of their own educational needs and their children's needs.  The bias among judges and the general public is to not even discuss that lesson, because government schools intend to expand forever, and not to shrink away (after their alleged mission is accomplished). 
    The Pledge has created much pro-government bias for jurors, judges and everyone. Today, the government has achieved a police state: schools are prisons with assembly line searches, and the same applies to the outside with assembly line searches (and probably at the U.S. Supreme Court, even for officers of the Court), papers are required to be carried and produced on demand, a new agency was given the terrifying name "the Department of Homeland Security," and there are proposals for a "virtual fence" with blanket searches around the Capitol.   The Media drone on about the same old parties (ignoring the Libertarian Party) and government balloons no matter which party is in office. Every cockamamy socialist idea is run up the flag pole to see who will salute from new taxes for sports stadia, to national identification cards using social security numbers that track everyone's employment, finances, residences, movements, and income for life.   Social Security began during early Pledge cases, 1935, as Congress adopted a scam already in use by the National Socialist German Workers' Party, and the Court upheld it in the "switch in time that socialized nine," a humiliating disgrace that has never been reversed (See the article "My socialist slave number is 262-00-6302" at http://rexcurry.net/ssnunconstitutional.html). 
    Government creates many things to which intelligent people pledge disallegiance.
    Most government action has nothing to do with the libertarian purpose of protecting individuals and their property from violence and theft. If the government's antidisestablishmentarianism does not end, then the police state will grow.
    The final proof of partiality appears if jurors and judges chant the Pledge of Allegiance in a courtroom.
    Stopping the Pledge is the least that needs to be done.   Otherwise, the only thing missing is to restore the original salute. 
    Even if jurors, judges and justices show partiality in court to government and its pledge, the defendant can still refuse to chant.  And the prosecution will be delighted if the defense objects to the Pledge, because it will prejudice many jurors against the defense.
    In this case the government claims that the pledge issue was mostly waived by lack of contemporaneous objection.  The government "wins" if the defense objects or not, and if the defendant sits out the Pledge.  That is the double edged sword about pledges in government schools or in courtrooms.  Case law recognizes the right to not chant, but it misses the point for a defendant seeking an acquittal against criminal charges.  
    Some defense attorneys (e.g. defense attorneys who are Jehovah’s Witnesses) will either have to lie in court and do the pledge, or risk prejudicing the jurors/judge/justices against the defendant.
    The power of the pledge and of government schools to override impartiality is shown by the Gobitas case.  After the Gobitas decision, Jehovah's Witnesses were violently attacked for refusing to chant in government schools.  Some of the Justices in this case lived through that period of time.
    In the 1930s, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazis) passed laws that required everyone to pledge allegiance, similar to many U.S. laws that have tried to require school children to recite the pledge. Jehovah's Witnesses believed that people who enjoy reciting government pledges are people who worship government. Jehovah's Witnesses were officially banned for refusing to join the raised palm salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party in schools and at public events. Many of the German Witnesses were imprisoned in concentration camps.
    In the 1940's, Jehovah's Witnesses refused to recite the pledge of allegiance in school on the grounds that it constituted worship of government (That was before adding the phrase "under God," although Jehovah’s Witnesses do not pledge after the addition of “under God”).  They hoped for a different response than they had met from the National Socialist German Workers' Party. In 1940, in Gobitas, the Supreme Court ruled that a government school could expel those children for refusing to salute the flag.
    A defendant in the U.S. today should expect a different result than he would expect if he were living in Germany during the National Socialist German Workers' Party and litigating the Pledge of Allegiance in his criminal trial.
    The violent aftermath of the Gobitas case is the reason for not infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms (including homemade machine guns as alleged in Wonschik's Commerce Clause argument):  self-defense against mob violence inspired by government schools, by the Pledge of Allegiance, and by cases such as Gobitas.
    One grand result of the Gobitas case and every case regarding government schools is that many people remove their children from government schools, as did the Gobitas parents.  And that is the real solution to the pledge debate and all other school litigation.  That is a way to avoid government’s partiality.
     Wonschik could be the next Gobitas case, or it could be the next Barnette case.  If decided the wrong way, then Wonschik could usher in the persecution of Jehovah's witnesses (and others) right in federal courtrooms, until three years later the decision is reversed (Barnette). The Gobitas and Barnette cases, and the history of Pledge litigation, demonstrate that it is a vehicle for persecuting Jehovah's Witnesses and others.  In a trial situation, the Pledge enables a prosecutor to identify Jehovah's Witnesses and then discriminate against them by striking them from a jury. 
    The webpage of the U.S. Supreme Court contains biographies of the Justices that enable an approximation of each Justice’s age in 1940 when the Gobitas decision was rendered (and the violence ensued): Justice John Paul Stevens, 20 (born 1920); Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, 16 (born 1924); Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, 10 (born in 1930); Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 7 (born 1933); Justice Antonin Scalia, 4 (born March 11, 1936); Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, 4 (born 1936); Justice Stephen G. Breyer, 2 (born 1938); Justice David Hackett Souter, 1 (born 1939); Justice Clarence Thomas was born in 1948.  
    Most people would have difficulty finding a alibi for 1940 through 1943 when the Barnette case reversed Gobitas.  Wonschik and all defendants have to worry about  how jurors/judges/justices were biased by those events and by later Pledge events.
    There would be the appearance of bias if any defendant in Wonschik's place learned that his petition to a Court would be decided by people who spent the first twelve years of their educations in government schools and robotically chanting the pledge every day upon the ring of a government bell.  There would probably be actual deep-seated psychological bias even though any past or present chanters might deny it to themselves and others.
    The lack of impartiality inspired by the pledge is evident in the Elk Grove case. Some people who filed briefs and comments in Elk Grove were self-proclaimed socialists.  They argued against only two words (instead of all 31 words) because they are socialists and won't expose socialism's horrors and the Pledge's horrid past.  They are ignorant of the full phrase "National Socialist German Workers Party" or they deliberately cover it up via exclusive use of the term "Nazi" (a common practice in the media).  They say "restore the Pledge" but only refer to it's pre-1954 version of 29 words.  They like the earlier pledge(s) except that they never mention the original salute as described by its national socialist author. They  protect the statist quo, and rampant ignorance of the term "Nazi."
    The Pledge should be restored to its pre-1892 version. 
    Francis Bellamy and the national socialists succeeded in a government takeover of schools.  The schools that the government imposed were racist and segregated and created bias and partiality among older adults.  Many Justices lived during a time when, if they attended government schools, then they might have attended schools that were mandated by law to be racist and segregated.
    The partiality problem would be analogous to a hypothetical case where a judge had been raised to chant a pledge supporting government racism and government segregation in government schools.  Later litigants who fought government's segregated schools would wonder about lingering biases.   The Pledge of Allegiance was not explicitly racist, however, its legacy in promoting government schools was racist.  And the famous cases fighting that racism only ended explicit segregation, they did not end the government schools that mandated it.  No one can measure the monstrous impact of government schools imposing racism and teaching racism as official policy for so long.    
    If the government had taken over all churches then the same horror would have resulted, with government-mandated racism in government churches.  The libertarian solution would have been to end socialized churches (as it is to end socialized schools).  The government solution would have been to mandate racism for decades and then suddenly order forced busing to integrate government churches.  There would have been no First Amendment's separation of church and state just as there is no separation of school and state. It is fortunate that the Constitution prevented government churches.  It is unfortunate that the Constitution did not prevent government schools, though they are no where authorized.
    It is said that Bellamy stopped attending church in 1924 because he couldn't stand the racism he found.  Bellamy could stand the racism and segregation in socialist schools.  He never told anyone to stop attending government schools because of it.   And many other of his own comments and acts reflect that Bellamy was a bigot.
    The government monopoly of education, and the segregation and persecution of people for "race" or "class" caused so much bias that it was adopted by the "industrial armies" of the socialist trio of atrocities and contributed to the monstrous Holocaust, which was part of the larger socialist "Wholecaust": the National Socialist German Workers' Party (21 million slaughtered); the People's Republic of China (35 million slaughtered) ; the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (62 million slaughtered). (death count from Professor R. J. Rummel's book "The encyclopedia of Genocide.").  The Bellamy Boys helped inspire them all (see "Edward Bellamy Abroad" (1961) by Sylvia E. Bowman).   They all showed that government is as incompetent to provide education as it is to provide food, clothing and shelter.
    As an attorney, I represented people facing the death penalty for murder. I never defended anyone as murderous as governments and government officials.
    Self-defense against socialist mass slaughter is a reason for not infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms (including homemade machine guns as alleged in Wonschik's Commerce Clause argument).
    The effect of robotic chanting (upon any student, juror or judge) is difficult to judge.  It was part of the "brainwashing" that occurred in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the Peoples' Republic of China, and the National Socialist German Workers' Party.  Some jurors and judges chanted the pledge every day in government schools at the ring of a bell like Pavlov's lapdogs of the state.   It did not turn every judge and juror into a Manchurian candidate, awaiting the secret pledge code in court. But that is not the test in this case.
    A telling test might count how many Stepford students, jurors and judges remain silent.  We the sheeple rarely exercise the right to be left alone in a crowd of robotic chanting.  The pledge practice in a prosecution should raise a red flag.
    Adding 18 years to the birth year of each Justice approximates the year that each was graduated from high school, to wit: Justice John Paul Stevens, 1938 (born 1920); Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, 1942 (born 1924); Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, 1948 (born in 1930); Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 1951 (born 1933); Justice Antonin Scalia, 1954 (born March 11, 1936); Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, 1954 (born 1936); Justice Stephen G. Breyer, 1956 (born 1938); Justice David Hackett Souter, 1957 (born 1939); Justice Clarence Thomas, 1966 (born 1948).
    The Court's webpage suggests that many Justices were fortunate in not attending government schools, however there is not enough detail for certainty.
    Some Justices were using the straight arm salute when the National Socialist German Workers' Party and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics invaded Poland in 1939 as allies in WWII.      There is probably a very shallow reason why the Pledge was codified by Congress in 1942 : To ditch the straight arm salute that was widespread among the states, and becoming very embarrassing and revealing.  The straight arm salute continued to be used in some government schools even into the 1960's.
    The 1954 act deifying the national socialist's pledge should not have been a choice between “theistic socialism” or “atheistic socialism,” but Congress compounded the 1942 mess in government schools with the 1954 tweaking.  A choice between two evils is still evil.   Through bizarre ignorance, the updated pledge more accurately pays homage to Bellamy's monstrous establishment of theistic socialism. 
    The Pledge of Allegiance for jurors and judges is a bigger bias problem than it is for students. It is a bigger problem than the problem in Barnette. Students aren't asked to uphold a verdict for the government, as are jurors and judges in a criminal trial. 
    Jurors have the right to pardon a defendant, or to nullify bad laws.  Those concepts are never mentioned in government schools.  After jurors and judges chant a pre-trial pledge, they might be asked by the government to imprison for life consenting adults who have never committed violent acts (e.g. drug cases). 
    The impartiality issue is comparable to a hypothetical case where a defendant is accused of shooting at a church or a school or a neighbor's home, and then the defendant discovers that the trial judge has a relationship to the church/school/neighbor, or had a daily relationship as a child, or that the judge leads the jurors in a pledge of allegiance to the church/school/neighbor.    On Wonschik's indictment, the "plaintiff" is not the alleged victim, it is the "United States of America."
    That is why the written ethics rules regarding recusal recite an “appearance of partiality.”
    "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America..." specifically names the party at the top of the indictment against Wonschik.   It is not a pledge to the alleged victim of a true crime (as that would present a problem for victimless crimes) and there is no mutual pledge naming Wonschik by jurors, judges or prosecutors.
    In the previous recusal in the Newdow case, Justice Scalia recused himself for remarks that Justice Scalia had made about the phrase "under God."  The argument for recusal here is even more compelling for any justice who chanted the pledge for years.   "Under God" is only two words and Scalia's remarks justifying recusal were few.  Justices who recited the pledge in school and elsewhere not only repeated the two words, they repeated the entire pledge, and it is a "pledge of allegiance" to the party on the indictment, and deifying that party.
    Petitioner deserves justices who did not attend government schools, or who did not participate in schools that had a daily robotic chanting on cue from the government.   
    Although non-government schools can recite the pledge, it seems rare, and it is not compelled or cajoled by law, nor done on the cue of government.  In a true free school, anyone who dislikes the pledge policy can go to a school with a better policy or use his money and time to create a better school. Only government thwarts everyone by stealing education funds from parents even when parents reject government schools.  Only government thwarts pledge choices by monopolizing schools and imposing solitary pledge policies statewide or even nationwide.  Only government expels those who it entraps and then pursues them (and their parents) with violent arrests and jail.  Worse still, government sometimes compels free schools to follow its monstrous habits.  That is the difference between the impartiality and tolerance of a free society, and the lack of impartiality that is spread under government schools and the Pledge of Allegiance.
 
LEGAL ANALYSIS
    The Code of Conduct for United States Judges,  Canon 3(C)(1) mirrors 28 USCS § 455 (a) in stating that "A judge shall disqualify himself or herself in a proceeding in which the judge's impartiality might reasonably be questioned."
    Canon 3(A)(6) states (in part) that "A judge should avoid public comment on the merits of a pending or impending action."
    This case is about jurors and judges who robotically chanted a socialist's Pledge of Allegiance daily in public for twelve years of their educations in government schools, and who might still chant the pledge to the flag "of the United States of America," and even doing so in courtrooms in federal courts in a criminal trial or appeal where the indictment states that the defendant is being prosecuted by the "United States of America."
    Under current case law, the totality of those circumstances support recusal. Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 540 (1994) reviewed the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 455, especially in view of the "massive changes" made in 1974 (510 U.S., at 546).  It was specifically noted that, "what matters is not the reality of bias or prejudice but its appearance. Quite simply and quite universally, recusal [i]s required whenever ‘impartiality might reasonably be questioned.'" (510 U.S., at 548).  Moreover, subsection (a) "covers all aspects of partiality."  (510 U.S., at 553). 
    Justice Kennedy's concurrence also made the point that recusal is mandatory here:
    [T]he central inquiry under § 455(a) is the appearance of partiality, not its place of origin;  510 U.S., at 563 (Kennedy, J., concurring).

    Disqualification is required if an objective observer would entertain reasonable questions about the judge's impartiality. If a judge's attitude or state of mind leads a detached observer to conclude that a fair and impartial hearing is unlikely, the judge must be disqualified. Indeed, in such circumstances, I should think that any judge who understands the judicial office and oath would be the first to insist that another judge hear the case; 510 U.S., at 564 (Kennedy, J., concurring).  and 
   
    Section 455(a) … addresses the appearance of partiality, guaranteeing not only that a partisan judge will not sit, but also that no reasonable person will have that suspicion.  510 U.S., at 567 (Kennedy, J., concurring).

    Liljeberg v. Health Services Acquisition Corp., 486 U.S. 847 (1988) – another Supreme Court case that considered 28 U.S.C. § 455 in depth – similarly emphasized that "a violation of § 455(a) is established when a reasonable person, knowing the relevant facts, would expect that a justice, judge, or magistrate knew of circumstances creating an appearance of partiality, notwithstanding a finding that the judge was not actually conscious of those circumstances." Liljeberg, 486 U.S. at 850. Along these lines, the lower courts have determined that:
        [T]he judge's actual state of mind, purity of heart, incorruptibility, or lack of partiality are not the issue. … The standard is purely objective. The inquiry is limited to outward manifestations and reasonable inferences drawn therefrom. In applying the test, the initial inquiry is whether a reasonable factual basis exists for calling the judge's impartiality into question. 

United States v. Cooley, 1 F.3d 985, 993 (10th Cir. 1993).
    It should be emphasized that it is not only a pledge in court that is of concern, but any conscious decision that any judge makes to seek out opportunities to publicly chant the pledge.  In fact, it was "the judge's expressive conduct in deliberately making the choice to appear in such a forum at a sensitive time to deliver strong views on matters which were likely to be ongoing before him" (Cooley, 1 F.3d at 995) that resulted in the Tenth Circuit's determination that the District Judge in Cooley should have recused himself.
    The foregoing in no way suggests that a judge or justice, even in an extrajudicial setting, is prohibited from enunciating his views on legal matters. On the contrary, "expressions of opinion on legal issues are not disqualifying" (Leaman v. Ohio Dep't of Mental Retardation & Developmental Disabilities, 825 F.2d 946, 950 (6th Cir. 1987) (note 1), and "[a] judge's views on legal issues may not serve as the basis for motions to disqualify." (United States v. Conforte, 624 F.2d 869, 882 (9th Cir. 1980)). However, the long history of the pledge, the fact that jurors and judges of certain ages were compelled to chant it under threat of expulsion and arrest, and the monstrous philosophy it promoted, which might be have been known to many people, adds additional dangers that provide grounds for recusal depending on the individual involved.
    The Court has noted the importance of "ensur[ing] that our deliberations will have the benefit of adversary presentation and a full development of the relevant facts." Bender v. Williamsport Area School Dist., 475 U.S. 534, 542 (1986). Here, a pledge indicates that the pledger is prepared to rule in a given manner absent such deliberations, precisely the situation for which 28 U.S.C. § 455 (a) was promulgated. If "[t]he test is whether an objective, disinterested, lay observer fully informed of the facts underlying the grounds on which recusal was sought would entertain a significant doubt about the judge's impartiality," Parker v. Connors Steel Co., 855 F.2d 1510, 1524 (11th Cir. 1988), then it would seem that the following would lead to exactly that doubt:
1. The constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance (and the words, “under God,”) is at issue;
2. A justice – fully aware that the case would soon likely appear before him – accepted a speaking invitation sponsored by the organization that ratified the Pledge and expanded it to include the words ‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance;
3. At that venue, the justice indicated – before the first petition ever reached his court – that the case was wrongly decided in the court below.
4. That based on their ages and partial biographies, it is very reasonable to assume that some or all of the justices might have attended government schools where they spent years chanting the Pledge daily upon the ring of a government bell, even with the original straight-arm salute, and under mandate of law or not, and with knowledge of the philosophy behind the pledge.
    "[T]he appearance of partiality is as dangerous as the fact of it." Conforte, 624 F.2d at 881. Because "a judge is under an affirmative, self-enforcing obligation to recuse himself sua sponte whenever the proper grounds exist." United States v. Kelly, 888 F.2d 732, 744 (11th Cir. 1989). 

CONCLUSION
    For the foregoing reasons, it is respectfully suggested that one, some or all Justices recuse himself/herself/themselves from any consideration of the instant litigation.
                   Respectfully submitted,  Rex Curry
In this case, the selection process was impermissibly tainted by the trial judge's request that all potential jurors stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance prior to jury selection. Furthermore, that bias also transgressed the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

All in favor of a pledge raise your right hand...