“The president of the United States has claimed, on more than one occasion, to be in dialogue with God. If he said that he was talking to God through his hairdryer, this would precipitate a national emergency. I fail to see how the addition of a hairdryer makes the claim more ridiculous or offensive.”
― Sam Harris, Letter to a Christian Nation
The motto “In God We Trust” was first challenged in Aronow v. United States in 1970, but the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled: “It is quite obvious that the national motto and the slogan on coinage and currency ‘In God We Trust’ has nothing whatsoever to do with the establishment of religion. Its use is of patriotic or ceremonial character and bears no true resemblance to a governmental sponsorship of a religious exercise.”
As the motto is mere cerimonial and not tied to a particular religion or non-religious grouping, the US mint has approved a motion to mint coins and bills imprinted with “In Allah We Trust”, “In Jahweh We Trust”, “In The Force We Trust”, “In Buddha We Trust”, “In Vishnu We Trust”, and “In No God We Trust” as well as the standard “In God We Trust”.
The selections were made through an online questionnaire presented by the mint in September though to December 2012. The mint confirms that the new currency will begin to appear in 2014, and new denominations of gods will be added (though not removed) as a public service to any requests that qualify for inclusion (based on number of requests represented as a percentile).
The minting of the different mottos will be in equal parts as to give no preferential treatment to any or no gods
