In God We Trust: A Motto Written on America’s Heart
When we reach into our pockets, we carry a statement as old as our national anthem. During the War of 1812, Francis Scott Key wrote the phrase “And this be our motto: In God is our Trust” into the poem that became “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Fifty years later, as the Union fought through the Civil War, a Pennsylvania pastor, Rev. Watkinson, wrote to Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase asking for recognition of Almighty God on the nation’s coins. Chase agreed, instructing the U.S. Mint that “The trust of our people in God should be declared on our national coins.” The phrase debuted on an 1864 two-cent coin, and the next year Congress authorized it on every gold and silver coin that had room.
Our forefathers never saw faith and liberty as rivals. The Declaration of Independence grounds our rights in a Creator, not the state, and the First Amendment was written to keep Washington from establishing a national church, not to remove God from our everyday life. In the 1950s, as America stood against atheistic Soviet communism, Congress doubled down on that heritage. A 1955 law required the motto on all currency, and on July 30, 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a law making “In God We Trust” the official national motto. The resolution passed both the House and Senate unanimously and without debate.
The liberal left still challenges the motto, yet it endures as it should. A motto that names no denomination and forces no worship fits squarely within the Founders’ vision of a free people under divine providence. In 2011, the House reaffirmed it by a 396–9 vote, and in 2014 Mississippi added it to its state seal. Every coin and bill reminds us that our freedoms are a gift from God, not government. That is a truth worth defending.
Sources
https://info.mysticstamp.com/this-day-in-history-july-30-1956-2_tdih/
https://fox5atlanta.com/news/in-god-we-trust-us-national-motto-history
https://constitutingamerica.org/?p=25998
https://coinweek.com/us-coins/in-god-we-trust-a-brief-history/
