The oath of office that presidents take on Inauguration Day is right there in the U.S. Constitution — at the end of Article II, Section 1. Take a look, and you will see that the oath does not include the words “so help me God” at the end, though presidents and the chief justices who swear them in have apparently added the words in every inauguration since 1933. Some historians say George Washington used the same words in the first inaugural, but others dispute that, and in any case the practice did not become common until the inaugurations of Franklin Roosevelt.
California atheist Michael Newdow — famed for challenging the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance — has gone to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking an injunction to prevent Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., as well as the congressional sponsors of the Jan. 20 inaugural and several other defendants, from inserting the words “so help me God” into the oath.
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