Black National Anthem History
The black national anthem, "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," is an ode to liberation, especially to African-Americans. The song is a tribute which harks back to Civil War-era President Abraham Lincoln's emancipation of the slaves. The song has a theme of freedom, hope and restoration, as seen from an African-American's view. The anthem's author, James Weldon Johnson, was born in 1871, 6 years after the Civil War ended. Johnson's mother was a public school teacher who impressed upon him the value of a strong education, while his father served as head waiter at an upscale hotel in Jacksonville, Florida.
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A Poem
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To mark Lincoln's birthday, Johnson, a Clark-Atlanta University graduate who was then serving as principal at the largest public grammar school in Jacksonville, Florida, penned the lyrics as an introduction to guest speaker Booker T. Washington. The piece was performed by 500 schoolchildren at segregated Edwin M. Stanton School, progenitor to Stanton College Preparatory School, on February 12, 1900. Five years later, Johnson's brother, composer John Rosamond Johnson, set the prose to music, crafting what would later be known as the black national anthem.
An Anthem
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The song was adopted as the "National Negro Anthem" in 1919 by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The NAACP, formed under the guidance of Harvard professor W.E.B. Dubois in 1909, favored a broad--and militant--agenda to address the disenfranchisement of nonwhite peoples in the United States. Ironically, James Weldon Johnson and his contemporary, Booker T. Washington, favored a more streamlined approach--appealing to the bourgeois--to solving the social ills seen among persons of color.
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A Song
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The song, "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," sung at black churches across the United States as well as at civil rights meetings, was the unifying force that brought the two very different ideological camps together. This union was finally solidified in the early 1960s during what was known as the Civil Rights Movement. Today, "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," along with its message of restoration and hope to peoples of color, is still sung at many African-American churches as a spiritual hymn. It is also the anthem of the largest black university system in the United States, Southern University and A&M College based in Louisiana.
Lyrics
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Lyrics to the song include this first verse:
Lift every voice and sing,
'Til earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us;
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,
Let us march on 'til victory is won.
Modern Adaptations
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The song has been used liberally in public in modern times. During the inauguration of President Obama in January 2009, Atlanta civil rights leader the Rev. Joseph Lowery recited the third verse to summarize the racial triumph of the moment. In 1990, singer Melba Moore recorded a contemporary version of the song, with backup vocals by music luminaries such as Stevie Wonder and Dionne Warwick.
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