Francis Scott Key, the flag, and the Star Spangled Banner.
The flag desecration amendment vote this week fell one vote short of passage in the Senate, 66-34. A two-thirds majority was required. As with most things important to the majority of Americans, it did pass in the House. That stalwart of the Senate, Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who accused our military of performing their duties at the Guantanamo Bay detention center like Nazis, Pol Pot's killing regime and Soviet's in their gulags, voted against protecting the flag. Has Durbin ever heard of Frances Scott Key?
The U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Francis Scott Key, sought to secure the release of Dr. William Beanes, who was captured during the burning of Washington. Key succeeded in this endeavor after a visit to the British Fleet in Chesapeake Bay. However, Key was detained on a ship during the shelling of Fort McHenry, which defended the city of Baltimore. The next morning, he saw that the American flag was still flying over the fort. This attorney and poet immediately penned a poem called "The Star Spangled Banner" to memorialize the event.
Key's poem, of course, was put to music and has been the country's official national anthem since 1931. The battle which Key witnessed occurred in September, 1814. What took Congress so long before designating the Star Spangled Banner as the national anthem? Perhaps it was because a British composer was the originator of the tune put to Key's words.
This story is a part of U.S. history. Every school-aged child is aware of the significance of July 4, 1776, our Independence Day. However, that "independence" has had to be defended on many occasions. This includes a war against France, our ally in the Revolutionary War, during the 1790's. The War of 1812, once again against the British, was another test of a young nation. Before the century was out, the Civil War and the Spanish American War were to be waged.
The War Between the States, our greatest test, was costliest, but made us stronger. It affirmed our most basic beliefs; that all men are created equal and that freedom and liberty is for all. In this war, the South adopted the banner of the "Bars and Stars," while the North retained the "Stars and Stripes." Known also as Old Glory, the American flag is not just a symbol of a nation, it is a defining symbol of freedom.
This July 4th is the 230th birthday of the American dream. It is a dream that is lived out all over the world. As our troops fight for freedom in Iraq and Afghanistan, they fight with the same blood, sweat and tears which were shed in Europe during World War I. They fight with the same blood, sweat and tears which fought in Europe and Asia during World War II and in the Korean War and the Vietnam War. It is the same blood, sweat and tears which Francis Scott Key commemorated when the nation was but 38 years into its existence.
O thus be it ever when free-men shall stand
Between their lov'd home and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust!"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Thank you, Mr. Key. Forever may it wave!
“The Red, White and Blue: Forever May it Wave!”
Yea! Yea!! Yea!!!
Plainly, the greatest, most powerful, richest, brilliant, and most charitable nation that has ever graced God’s green earth! I teach my daughters to know only God and a million men or so love them more than their father. Those million men? Every soldier that has ever served and died to protect the time and place we occupy now. For there is no greater love than this that a man lay down his life for his friends. Not for his wife, daughter, or ideas, but for his friends, yet even the ones that now only exist in the Divine Mind, but thereafter, we pray will be taught to love their God, their family, and the country whose heroes died so they could have those first two great privilileges, Let Freedom Ring!
Sorry, but my favorite is Irving Berlin’s God Bless America. Written toward the end of World War I, I think that Mr. Berlin’s masterpiece demonstrates every American’s deepest feelings about the greatest country on Earth, While remaining true to the basic GODLINESS of our republic.
An attitude of militarism and warmongering defaces the Star Spangled Banner, seriously compromising its value to our nation whose ideals, at least, always included peace, even though we would be prepared to fight to DEFEND ourselves!
There is no militarism defacing God Bless America, there is no reference to the attendent bloodshed and loathsome warmongering which has so often corrupted and polluted the history of our great homeland and its government, there are no “bombs bursting in air” there is not even a reference to the American flag!
It is a glorious hymn to the wonders of this country, its people’s quiet and dignified love of our land, to our faith in the almighty, and I submit that it deserves to be our national anthem!
GOD BLESS AMERICA!!
David K. Meller
PS- One reason God Bless America was denied its deserved status as our National Anthem was because some idiot congressmen in the 1930′s took objection to the fact that its author was an immigrant Jew ( Irving Berlin CHOSE to be an American, but the congressbigots who objected did nothing except for getting born here!) DKM
Of course the song America the Beautiful is very nice too!
This country came into existence with a history of its own. No Pain, no gain. May it be war or peace, the ideal behind it speaks for all who treasure freedom.
Mr. Meller contradicts himself when he says:
“An attitude of militarism and warmongering defaces the Star Spangled Banner, seriously compromising its value to our nation whose ideals, at least, always included peace, even though we would be prepared to fight to DEFEND ourselves!”
By his own admission, self-defense is not warmongering and that is precisely the case the Star Spangled Banner describes. Only the final verse of the poem makes any reference to conquest, and that he must be taking out of context. The full final stanza of the poem reads:
“O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the Heaven-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!”
‘Conquer’ in this context (and as commonly used in Keys time) included conquering an enemy attacking us on our own soil . Throughout his poem, Keys describes the valiant fight by Americans defending home and country against an enemy out to destroy us and deprive us of freedom. Is this not precisely the case Mr. Meller makes as being legitimate?
It is clear, however, Meller is not just against aggressive war but against all war, and can find ample means to vilify defensive war as he does aggression by simply imposing extraneous causes that justify our enemies. This is hardly a new theme, and Meller’s complaint rings hollow with it.
Meller, like many pacifists, would hobble us against all war on the presumption there is never a legitimate or just case for it. He would have us restrict ourselves to defense only against invasion once the enemy is on our soil and has every advantage. Frequently in war, that is too late and suicidal. Enemies do not invade when their strength is insufficient to their designs; they invade when success seems a foregone conclusion. Pacifism often seems noble, but it can also be incredibly stupid.
It is interesting Meller mentions Irving Berlin and the congressman who objected on the basis of Berlin’s Jewishness. I am also a Jew and I know this story. The story is apocryphal, though it may have substance. However, it is unlikely that all the congressmen who voted down the proposal were motivated by bigotry. Many simply saw no reason to change our national anthem, and I tend to agree. America the Beautiful is a great song. So are Battle Cry of Freedom, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, God Bless the USA, Hail Columbia, The Liberty Bell, My Country, ‘Tis of Thee, This is My Country, This Land Is Your Land, You’re a Grand Old Flag. And, so is our Star Spangled Banner. Our anthem recalls a moment in our history when our country teetered on the brink symbolized by disappearance and reappearance of our flag. The potential of that loss is captured in Keys’ phrases and emotions. Of all the songs written, none capture this frailty, defiance and hope half so well. Even supposing another song its equal, that would be insufficient to change it now when it is burned in our hearts and a symbol to all the world of our freedom. Any change now signals a loss of resolve that would be unconscionable.