Lyrics for Independence Day
Happy Independence Day! As a public service, I post below the lyrics of the National Anthem and the prayer for God to bless America. I draw the readers’ attention to the often overlooked second and third stanzas.
The Defense of Fort M’Henry
by
Francis Scott Key
O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
‘Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country, should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave,
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war’s desolation.
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the Heav’n 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!
Please note that the ‘hireling and slave’ mentioned in the third stanza refer to Hessian mercenaries hired by the British crown, and to the Colonial Marines, whose ranks included enslaved Africans to whom the British promised freedom in return for their military service, some from East India, some from the Caribbean, and some from Georgia. The promise, at least is some cases, proved false, as after the war any slaves who escaped to the British were returned to their former owners.
This assumes the poet was not using the word slaves poetically, referring to the subjects and servants of the King, who were not free men.
America the Beautiful
by
Katherine Lee Bates
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassioned stress
A thoroughfare of freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!
O beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife.
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life!
America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness
And every gain divine!
O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
Please note that the prayer in the second stanza plead God to mend our flaws, to confirm our souls in self-control, and to confirm our liberty in law.
This mention of virtue, liberty, and law, is alien to the modern political theories of socialist plutocracy, anarchist totalitarianism and libertarian collectivism which forms the mainstream of political dialectic.
The ideal of law is anathema to anarcho-libertarians and radicals, and the ideal of liberty is anathema to collectivist totalitarians. How these two opposites have managed to combine, in the modern day, into a single movement of CIA-funded corporate anarcho-racist Woketopianism enforced by Big Tech oligarchs is a Hegelian mystery.
But the remaining stanzas glorifying pilgrims and heroes are equally anathema to them.
The foes the next American war for independence must face have captured each major institution of life, from the newsrooms to the theater to Capitol Hill to the Wall Street to the salons of the intellectuals, the ivory towers of the Academy, to the churchtowers, synagogues and chapels of public worship, and they command all the controlling heights.
May God allow the restoration of our rights, duties and liberties be without bloody revolution. All peaceful means must be exhausted before open warfare is justified.
Let not our righteous wrath at the open fraud of the last election drive us to violate our sacred oaths of allegiance to the Flag. The enemy, after all, justified their election fraud in the name of saving the nation from us.
Treason is a worse breach of the public peace than fraud, and delivers a deeper wound whose scars time will not erase.
Nonetheless, organize, gather arms, ammunition, food stuffs, and prepare for shortages and outages of petrol, water and power. Even without an open rebellion from the 80 millions cheated of our votes this last election, the policies of the current administration, if left unchecked, will prompt economic collapse, rising crime waves, and the disintegration of the body politic.
Let us not forget the great events and great men which lead to the composition of these lyrics.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
