Please someone point out the racist, pro-slavery, anti-black parts ............
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 someone point out the racist, pro-slavery, anti-black parts <
The race-baiters will point to these lines in the second stanza:
“No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave”
The “hireling” refers to German mercenaries in British employ. The “slave” refers to runaway slaves who joined the British forces in return for the promise of freedom.
Neither reference is pro-slavery, or anti-black. Francis Scott Key was just saying that those British forces were defeated in the battle.
Oh, I see the trigger. In the last stanza, Francis Scott Key uses the word “freemen.”
Obviously, he was writing about being free from England, but I can certainly understand why some would need a safe space to recover from a stanza that no one ever sings. /s
Because Frances Scott Key was a slaveholder. Wheras England.......well, I don't know, they had slaves, lots of them in the Carribean.
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Who knows, no, many colored people weren't free, but to suggest they weren't brave, free or not, they'd be screaming racism.
It gets publicity. And donations.