Time to retire the national anthem? July 8, 2021 column

By MARSHA MERCER

To celebrate the new Juneteenth federal holiday, Vanessa Williams sang “Lift Every Voice and Sing” at the end of the “A Capitol Fourth” Independence Day concert in Washington.

“Lift Every Voice and Sing” is known as the Black national anthem, so, naturally, critics blasted the singer-actress as well as broadcaster PBS for going “woke.”

No matter that opera star Renée Fleming opened the show with “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

“There’s only one National Anthem that covers everyone. It doesn’t matter what color you are,” one man wrote on Twitter, expressing a common theme.

Or does it? A national anthem should bring people together in the shared love of country. Does “The Star-Spangled Banner” still measure up?

The NAACP recognized “Lift Every Voice” as its official song in 1919, and over the last century it has become beloved as the Black national anthem.

Francis Scott Key wrote “The Star-Spangled Banner” after watching the British attack Fort McHenry near Baltimore in 1814 and seeing the American flag still flying in victory in “dawn’s early light.” He put words to the tune of a then-popular English drinking song.

But Key was also a slaveholder and a lawyer who argued in court for the “right” to own slaves.

In our time of racial reckoning and reconsideration, statues to Key have been toppled as many people learn about Key and rarely sung verses of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” The anthem’s third verse includes the line:

“No refuge could save the hireling and slave/From the terror of flight or gloom of the grave.” The line is open to interpretation, and Key never explained what he meant. Some academics read it as overtly racist, while others see it as a reference to European mercenaries and enslaved Africans the British used as mercenaries in the War of 1812.

Americans alive today have grown up singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the national anthem. But it wasn’t always so. “Ripley’s Believe It or Not!” ran a cartoon in 1929 with the caption, “Believe It or Not, America has no national anthem.”

That oversight was rectified in 1931, when President Herbert Hoover signed a bill into law designating “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

Even then the choice was controversial – though not for race reasons. The New York Herald Tribune said the anthem had “words that nobody can remember to a tune that nobody can sing.”

It was also criticized as too militaristic and too anti-British.

For years, civil rights advocates have called for changing the national anthem.

Doing so would take an act of Congress and 60 votes in the Senate to override a filibuster or presidential veto, so that’s unlikely.

Rep. James Clyburn, Democrat of South Carolina, introduced in January a measure to make “Lift Every Voice” the national hymn. Black writer and activist James Weldon Johnson wrote the poem in 1899 to celebrate the anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday.

Clyburn, the highest-ranking Black in Congress, says making the song a hymn would bring people together in “an act of healing.”

That may be a reach. Clyburn has only about 40 cosponsors in the House, and there is no companion bill in the Senate.

Progress takes time. In May, Maryland finally repealed its offensive state song. “Maryland, My Maryland” was written in 1861 during the heat of the Civil War and has references to Lincoln as a “tyrant” and “despot” and suggests Union soldiers are “Northern scum.”

The Virginia General Assembly couldn’t quite bring itself to repeal Virginia’s  state song, “Carry Me Back to Old Virginia,” with its racist connotations. The legislature did demote it to “state song emeritus” in 1997.

Virginia now has an official traditional state song, “Our Great Virginia,” a revision of “Oh Shenandoah,” and an official popular song, “Sweet Virginia Breeze,” which was popular in 1980.

Americans increasingly recognize our history is complicated and certain iconic people, place names and even songs are hurtful to a large swath of the population.

It’s time we consider what we want the national anthem to accomplish.

If it is to bring us together, as I think it should, we should consider retiring “The Star-Spangled Banner” as our national anthem.

My choice would be “America the Beautiful.”

©2021 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

 

One King to honor, another to shun -- Jan. 17, 2019 column

By MARSHA MERCER

Two men named King are in the news.

First, let us turn to a King who deserves our admiration and respect. A federal holiday Monday honors the life and memory of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The slain civil rights leader, who won the Nobel Peace Prize at the age of 35 for his nonviolent campaign against racism, would have turned 90 on Jan. 15. He was 39 when his life was cut tragically short by a sniper April 4, 1968.

It’s instructive, given recent events involving another man named King, to remember the MLK Jr. holiday was hard won.

Congress dithered for 15 years, and Sen. Jesse Helms, Republican of North Carolina, filibustered the bill with 300 pages of documents accusing King of being a Marxist with communist leanings.

Democratic Sens. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York declared the papers “filth.”

Eventually Congress did the right thing and sent the bill to President Ronald Reagan, who signed the King holiday into law in 1983. The first observance was in 1986. Still some states lagged. Arizona did not recognize the holiday until 1992 and New Hampshire 1999. 

Now, though, every year on the third Monday in January, people gather for prayer breakfasts and worship services, read King’s writings and tell his stories to younger generations. Choirs sing, bells toll and people march. Many devote their time to volunteering on the national day of service.

The day demands action because Martin Luther King Jr’s work is far from done.

 “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,” he said.

And that brings us to the other, lesser, King in the news.

Rep. Steve King, Republican of Iowa, after a career of racist rhetoric, has finally been punished. He was kicked off the powerful Agriculture, Judiciary and Small Business committees and has been urged to resign from Congress.

The furor stemmed from a Jan. 10 interview in The New York Times.

“White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization – how did that language become offensive?” King said. “Why did I sit in classes teaching me about the merits of our history and civilization?”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, suggested King “find another line of work” if he didn’t understand why his comments were offensive. White House press secretary Sarah Sanders called the remarks “abhorrent.”

King tried to tamp down the outrage by insisting he did not advocate white nationalism or white supremacy, had been misquoted and his remarks taken out of context

Rep. James Clyburn, Democrat of South Carolina, the top African-American congressional leader, introduced a measure to condemn the substance of King’s remarks, pointing out it was MLK Jr.’s 90^th birthday. Clyburn referred to a “tale of two Kings.”

The House voted 424 to 1 for the resolution. Even King voted for it. The only no vote was Rep. Bobby Rush, Democrat of Illinois, who thought the resolution too weak and wanted the house to censure King.

Other House Democrats thought censuring a member of Congress for speech outside Congress could be a bad precedent, especially given the new crop of outspoken Democratic members.

The full House punted on censure on a voice vote, referring the matter to the House Ethics Committee.

Steve King is at least isolated and immobilized. Several newspapers in Iowa say he has embarrassed the state long enough and should resign. He says he won’t resign, which is always what people say until the moment they do.  

So let Steve King stew in his bitter juices, and let us shun him and his boneheaded ideas while we celebrate the inspiring life of Martin Luther King Jr.

The open-air Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial and bookshop in Washington remain open during the partial government shutdown. Among the MLK quotations on his memorial is this from 1959:

“Make a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the noble struggle for equal rights. 

You will make a better person of yourself, a greater nation of your country, and a finer world to live in.”

Those are words to live by on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday and every day.

©2019, Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

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