I’ve always assumed that the pauses make it easier to remember the words. It has also occurred to me that the pauses nudge us to remove the meaning from what the words say when strung together. The same is true with the Presidential oath, the oath we take before testifying in court, and singing the star spangled banner.

I can remember memorizing both the pledge and the national anthem as a kid in school and never thinking about or recognizing what either one meant until we learned about it, maybe in second or third grade and then forgetting those meanings just as quickly shortly after. Both the pledge and the anthem are about reverence to the flag, which of course then complicates things when we have to discuss whether flag burning is acceptable speech or not.

It also complicates things regarding religion. The pledge mentions a god, as does all of our currency and oaths in court and of office include the hand on the bible routine. Both the mention of a God in the pledge and on our currency were added after they were originally codified. As for swearing in, while a Christian Bible isn’t specified, many Americans seem to object to somebody outside the Christian-Judeo tradition using a bible more meaningful to them when taking an oath.

Personally, I think this has lead to a mass misunderstanding of what this nations is, should be, and was intended to be by the people who founded it.