Wave it good-bye?: Three Reasons to Keep The Star-Spangled Banner

Friend GC, a journalist, historian, and author, has begun (or picked up on) an FB campaign to adopt a new national anthem, on the grounds that The Star-Spangled Banner essentially commemorates a minor battle in an obscure war and therefore doesn't speak to the ideals that make the United States a great country. I disagree. Though I don't particularly love the idea of a militaristic anthem and there's nothing in the SPB (first verse anyway) about democratic ideals and values or even about popular sovereignty, there are some great, even unique qualities in our national anthem that I would not want to toss aside. Here are three: First, it's dramatic. Very few if any anthems actually tell a story, and this is a powerful one, beautifully narrated: Imagine (or picture) the people of Baltimore watching the battle in the harbor, unsure of its direction or outcome (this was before Twitter), the scariness of the explosions and the gunshots, knowing that your friends and neighbors possible were being wounded or killed, the excitement of seeing the flag through a few glimpses of explosive light - the odd drama of spectators watching a war, an experience slightly replicated in contemporary sports but without the stakes. You have to remember that at that time the U.S. was a fledgling, not the world's greatest economic power for better or worse, and it was entirely possible that the country would be conquered and the whole noble experiment dashed - the great uncertainty of that time should give us pause if we smugly think that the U.S. today is invulnerable. Second, it's symbolic: watching the fate of the nation through the course of a trying night makes us think about the terrible times the U.S. has gone through and, so far, withstood and come out stronger. Passing through a night of trauma to a welcoming dawn is a beautiful literary trope and something we all can feel on a personal level as well. Third, it's open-ended: I would guess The Star-Spangled Banner is the only national anthem written in the interrogative. The entire first stanza is really a question, and though singers generally present the song with bold bravura, in essence, it's a question and a plea: does the banner still wave? and does it wave over the land of the free and the home of the brave? In 1812, certainly not all under the banner were free. It's important to think of the Star-Spangled Banner as a question we should be always asking of ourselves and one another - not a smug assurance of our unique or exceptional status as a people.