"The Pledge of Allegiance, controversial?

You bet.

Sen. Warren E. Barry, R-Fairfax, sponsored a contentious bill to require school children to recite the pledge.

But he couldn't even pledge allegiance to his own proposal after a committee got through altering it. Their revision: Take out the part that called for mandatory suspension of any student who would not recite the pledge. After that, Mr. Barry called some of the committee members 'a bunch of pinkos.'

'Its late in the session and people are tired and a little cranky,' Said a forbearing Del. Thomas M. Jackson Jr., the Carroll County Democrat who proposed leaving pledge punishment to the discretion of local school officials.

Now, those of us who have enjoyed the benefits of liberty bought and paid it often with blood, by those who went before ought to be glad to pledge allegiance to, the flag of the nation that shines a, worldwide beacon of fivedom. Children should be taught the pledge, should be so well-grounded in their heritage that they understand why their country and flag are worthy of respect.

But enforced patriotism? That's like enforced love - you either feel it or you don't. You can nurture the conditions in which it might flourish but you cannot coerce its development. In fact, enforced patriotism is an oxymoron - as soon as it is imposed from outside it ceases to be patriotism. Worse, it risks mutating into a matrix for rebellion.

Supporters of the bill may say that requiring school children to say the pledge is merely one of those nurturing moments. From it children can learn the habit of respect of country.

Fine. But what happens when a child refuses to repeat the pledge?

Under Mr. Barry's proposal, that child would not simply earn a trip to the principal's office.

He'd be suspended from school.

Come on. Let's show a little common sense here. Kick a kid out of school for what might be anything from mere naughtiness to conscientious civil disobedience?

Yet the effort to inject a little common sense into the measure provoked Mr. Barry's wrath.

He was so disgusted with the watered-down version, he tried to pull his own bill from consideration. The committee wouldn't let him. The fifth House might vote on it today.

But issues of patriotism and punishment aside, schools don't need the General Assembly, giving them any more, extraneous mandates. From time to time, the legislature attempts to pan bills telling teachers what to teach, - down to the very details and administrators how to administrate.

This is not the Assembly's job.

Teachers and administrators have enough to do without being forced to implement the results of some lawmaker's political grandstanding.

Sure, let children recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

If it absolutely can't help itself, let the legislature even require recitation of the pledge.

But for goodness sakes, leave any 'punishment' to local discretion.

The state won't be teaching patriotism or respect by kicking kids out of school for failure to mouth words, even the cherished words of the Pledge of Allegiance" (The Daily Progress, February 16, 2001).