House Re-Reaffirms 'In God We Trust' as Motto

Fear not: “In God We Trust” is still the national US motto. Installed in 1956 and already reaffirmed in 2002 and 2006, the House once again voted to reaffirm it yesterday after an apparently dramatic 35-minute debate Tuesday night, the Washington Post reports. Dramatic, at least, in that Rep. Trent Franks took the opportunity to declare that if the House doesn’t believe in God, then “we should just let anarchy prevail because, after all, we are just worm food.”

Fortunately for Franks, 395 of his fellow House members agreed with him; only nine members voted nay. President Obama, however, apparently found the whole thing a little ridiculous. “In the House of Representatives, what have you guys been doing, John [Boehner]?” he wondered. “You’ve had legislation reaffirming that ‘In God We Trust’ is our motto. That’s not putting people back to work. I trust in God, but God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people back to work." Retorted the bill's sponsor, “Our citizens need that kind of hope, and that kind of inspiration." (More In God We Trust stories.)