What
this country needs – oh, does it need – is an issue on which liberals and
conservatives can unite and on which the country can voice its approval, loudly
and enthusiastically. Here is such an
issue.
It
is time we should change our national anthem.
The Star Spangled Banner is hard to sing and is out of step with the
national mood, which is less militaristic than it used to be. The country, according to most polls, is
tired of “bombs bursting in air” and is ready for “amber waves of grain” or
“the oceans white with foam.”
You
like bombs bursting in air? Then the present anthem fails on musical grounds.
How many of us, hearing O, Canada
sung at the hockey playoffs or the Russian national anthem sung at Sochi,
sighed, “I wish we had an anthem like
that.” (How
many singers have had the same thought?)
If
it were put to a popular vote, two candidates would probably emerge: America the Beautiful and God Bless America. Either one, in my opinion, is better than The Star Spangled Banner. They are both stirring melodies. America
the Beautiful was written by Samuel Ward, a choirmaster, and Katherine Lee
Bates, in 1910. God Bless America, as everyone knows, was written by Irving Berlin
in 1918 and revised by him (for Kate Smith) in 1938. Both are well known and sung often; in fact, God Bless America has become a
surrogate national anthem, sung at the home half of the seventh inning at many
major-league baseball games.
For
more than 150 years, the United States had no national anthem. Then, in 1931, President Herbert Hoover
signed an act making The Star Spangled
Banner the national anthem. It has had a long and distinguished life, but
now it is time for a new national anthem, easier to sing and having more
inspired lyrics. It is time to move on. Is
there a political leader around who will take up the cause?
