The move to outfit Creek County Sheriff’s cruisers with the nation’s motto is apparently offending some folks, though Sheriff John Davis insists the new decals are an act of patriotism, not an attempt to promote religion.

Davis move forward with his plan last week to put “In God We Trust” decals on all of the sheriff’s department’s detective and deputy vehicles, and some in the small Oklahoma community are raising objections, News On 6 reports.

“I am concerned by your overtly religious decal on your vehicles … do you see how this could be seen as a hostile signal to nonbelievers?” Natalie Schirmer posted to Facebook.

“I don’t want my government to trust God,” wrote Michael Robinson, who claimed to be a Christian. “I want them to be trusting intellect and the rules set forth by our constitution.”

But Davis told the news site the new decals have more to do with patriotism than religion, and pointed out “In God We Trust” has been the national motto since the Eisenhower administration.

“This is patriotic,” Davis said. “It’s our national motto. It’s not that the Creek County Sheriff’s office is trying to impose or force religious beliefs on anybody.”

According to the U.S. Department of Treasury website, “In God We Trust” was first put on U.S. currency in 1864.

“The way our country is now,” Davis told News on 6, “we need all the patriotism we can get.”

Davis said he’s told deputies if they object to the motto on their particular car, he’ll have it removed, and pointed out that no tax dollars were used to buy the decals. They were donated, he said.

“If I have an employee that comes to me and says ‘I don’t want it on the car that I’m assigned.’ I don’t have a problem with that,” Davis said. “I’ll allow them to make that decision whether or not they want it on that car.”

And despite the objections of some, many residents seem to support the move.

“It’s just a decal on a car,” Sapulpa resident Crystal Wall told the news site, “it’s not forcing anybody to do anything they don’t want to do.”

Tulsa resident Elliott Sumrall agreed.

“I’m all for it,” he said. “It’s kind of what our country was founded on, so I have no complaints at all.”

According to sources cited by Wikipedia:

“In God we trust” as a national motto and on U.S. currency has been the subject of numerous unsuccessful lawsuits. The motto 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.” The decision was cited in Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow, a 2004 case on the Pledge of Allegiance. These acts of “ceremonial deism” are “protected from Establishment Clause scrutiny chiefly because they have lost through rote repetition any significant religious content.” In Zorach v. Clauson (1952), the Supreme Court also held that the nation’s “institutions presuppose a Supreme Being” and that government recognition of God does not constitute the establishment of a state church as the Constitution’s authors intended to prohibit

Aside from constitutional objections, President Theodore Roosevelt took issue with using the motto on coinage as he considered using God’s name on money to be sacrilege.