California Free Press

Off the Top of My Head

O Say Can You See That Francis Scott Key Was a Racist?

by John Lawrence

When Francis Scott Key wrote the "National Anthem," he was a slave holding lawyer from an old Maryland plantation family who spent his life in court fighting against abolitionists. The third stanza of his song written aboard a British ship mentions "slaves and hirelings," a reference to the fact that escaped and emancipated slaves fought on the side of the British in the War of 1812. The British promised refuge to any enslaved Black people who escaped their enslavers, raising fears among White Americans of a large-scale revolt. The final provocation was that men who escaped their bonds of slavery were welcome to join the British Corps of Colonial Marines in exchange for land after their service. As many as 4,000 people, mostly from Virginia and Maryland, escaped. They were later given land in in Trinidad and Tobago to resettle with their families. Their descendants, called “Merikins,” still live there today.

Who else fought on the side of the British and likely prevented Canada from being annexed to the US? Indians. They were later abandoned by the British, and, with the death of Tecumseh, the Indians' hopes for a confederation were largely dashed. Hero of the war, Andrew Jackson, later as President presided over the "Indian removal" as Indians were forced off their traditional lands onto the Trail of Tears. At the beginning of the 1830s, nearly 125,000 Native Americans lived on millions of acres of land in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida–land their ancestors had occupied and cultivated for generations. By the end of the decade, very few natives remained anywhere in the southeastern United States. Working on behalf of white settlers who wanted to grow cotton on the Indians’ land, the federal government forced them to leave their homelands and walk hundreds of miles to a specially designated “Indian territory” across the Mississippi River. This difficult and sometimes deadly journey is known as the Trail of Tears.

Oppressed people of the young nation fought in a war that was fought over British "impressment", a practice of the British who captured American seamen and made them work on British ships. This practice was actually ended before the war started, but due to the fact that transatlantic communications took weeks, the war was started before word was received that impressment had been ended.

The third stanza of The Star Spangled Banner contains the words

                                                        "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."

Many rewrite the last line as "the land of the oppressed and the home of the slave." When he wrote the poem that would, in 1931, become the national anthem and proclaim our nation “the land of the free,” Key not only profited from slaves, he harbored racist conceptions of American citizenship and human potential. Africans in America, he said, were: “a distinct and inferior race of people, which all experience proves to be the greatest evil that afflicts a community.”

So was Colin Kaepernick right? Were Tommie Smith and John Carlos right when they raised their fists on the victory stand in the 1968 Olympics during the playing of the Star Spangled Banner? Did they even know about Key's racist past at that point? Recently, Gwen Berry, a contender for a medal at the Summer Olympics this year in Tokyo, has already raised her fist on a medal podium at a competition, and at the selection meet for the U.S. Olympic track team she turned away as the national anthem was played, drawing worldwide attention. When you consider Francis Scott Key's life of virulent racism, it's not hard to understand why.

The Smithsonian magazine reported:

Ironically, while Key was composing the line "O'er the land of the free," it is likely that black slaves were trying to reach British ships in Baltimore Harbor. They knew that they were far more likely to find freedom and liberty under the Union Jack than they were under the “Star-Spangled Banner.”

Additionally, Key used his office as the District Attorney for the City of Washington from 1833 to 1840 to defend slavery, attacking the abolitionist movement in several high-profile cases.

In the mid-1830s, the movement was gaining momentum and with it came increased violence, particularly from pro-slavery mobs attacking free blacks and white abolitionists, and other methods to silence the growing cries for abolition. In a House of Representatives and United States Senate inundated with petitions from abolitionists calling for the ending or restriction of slavery, pro-slavery Congressmen looked for a way to suppress the voices of abolitionists.

In the same year, shortly after a race riot in Washington, D.C. when an angry white mob set upon a well-known free black restaurant owner, Key likewise sought to crack down on the free speech of abolitionists he believed were riling things up in the city. Key prosecuted a New York doctor living in Georgetown for possessing abolitionist pamphlets.

In the resulting case, U.S. v. Reuben Crandall, Key made national headlines by asking whether the property rights of slaveholders outweighed the free speech rights of those arguing for slavery’s abolishment. Key hoped to silence abolitionists, who, he charged, wished to “associate and amalgamate with the negro.”

Though Crandall’s offense was nothing more than possessing abolitionist literature, Key felt that abolitionists’ free speech rights were so dangerous that he sought, unsuccessfully, to have Crandall hanged.

During the Andrew Jackson administration, Key served as the district attorney for Washington, D.C., where he spent much of his time shoring up enslavers’ power. He strictly enforced slave laws and prosecuted abolitionists who passed out pamphlets mocking his jurisdiction as the “land of the free, home of the oppressed.” So is it fitting and proper to stand during the National Anthem when it's composer was a virulent racist? The Star Spangled Banner, although written in 1814 didn't become the National Anthem till 1931, over 100 years later primarily due to the efforts of the Daughters of the Confederacy. “The elevation of the banner from popular song to official national anthem was a neo-Confederate political victory, and it was celebrated as such,” according to Jefferson Morley, author of “Snow-Storm in August: Washington City, Francis Scott Key, and the Forgotten Race Riot of 1835. “When supporters threw a victory parade in Baltimore in June 1931, the march was led by a color guard hoisting the Confederate flag.”

American history needs to be reexamined in the light of the atrocities perpetrated on African Americans and native American peoples. We can honor the lofty rhetoric of the Declaration of Independence, but we must remember at the same time that its author, Thomas Jefferson, was the owner of 175 slaves and the father of some of them.  The composer who wrote the inspirational words of the Star Spangle Banner also spent his life as a lawyer defending white supremacy and fighting against the abolition of slavery.

Off the Top of My Head

Republicans Represent a Diasporized Ku Klu Klan

by John Lawrence

America First was also a credo of the white supremacist Ku Klux Klan organization. This assertion rated true by Snopes. Now Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz are embarking on an "America First" tour of the USA. It seems that the US can not get over its racist past. Republicans are basing their party on lies like that Trump won the election. Maybe the biggest lie was the one Thomas Jefferson wrote when he penned the preamble to the Constitution: All men are created equal. That was patently a lie because Jefferson himself was a slave owner as was George Washington and many of the other Founding Fathers.Obviously, Native Americans were not created equal. Neither were African Americans. So why did Jefferson create the first BIG LIE which Trump and the likes of Marjorie Taylor Greene are only perpetuating. On the other hand the sentiments embodied in Jefferson's preamble can be seen as aspirational and that is the tack the Democratic party is taking at the present time. Let's make this a country where all men, women and children are in fact created equal.

The Ku Klux Klan has become normalized in the Republican party which pretends to exemplify our Anglo Saxon heritage. So let's just go back to the era of King George, why don't we? Republicans could change their name to the Tory party. The term Tory or "Loyalist" was used in the American Revolution for those who remained loyal to the British Crown. Since early in the 18th century, Tory had described those upholding the right of the King over Parliament. During the war of independence, particularly after the Declaration of Independence in 1776, this use was extended to cover anyone who remained loyal to the British Crown. The US has already become a neo-feudal society with great wealth concentrated in the upper one percent, and great poverty concentrated among black and brown people. "America First" is just a slogan for perpetuating the idea that those who are superior by dint of their having acquired great wealth should be the nobiity and the lesser among us should just be content with their lot of a few crumbs from the table. They surely shouldn't be given de facto equal rights despite the fact that the Constitution says that they were created equal.

A diaspora is a spreading out of a people or a philosophy. The Ku Klux Klan used to be concentrated mainly in the South. The Republican party is still based there, but the philosophy has metastasized to include white supremacists in the heartland as well. "Republican" is a more respectable name for a philosophy that bears an eerie resemblance to that of the Ku Klux Klan. "America First: really means "white people first." Let's just keep the example that white people were the ones that first officiated over the construction of a so-called democracy, one that denied women, African Americans and Native Americans the vote. The only reason they let in eastern and southern  Europeans was that they needed their labor power. Asians were discriminated against and even put in concentration camps during the Second World War. What has been consistent about America is the fact that white people have held the reins of power ever since the country began. African Americans, who have been here as long as white people have, were first enslaved and then subjected to Jim Crow laws. Native Americans were herded onto reservations.

At the beginning of the 1830s, nearly 125,000 Native Americans lived on millions of acres of land in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida–land their ancestors had occupied and cultivated for generations. By the end of the decade, very few natives remained anywhere in the southeastern United States. Working on behalf of white settlers who wanted to grow cotton on the Indians’ land using black slaves as labor power, the federal government forced them to leave their homelands and walk hundreds of miles to a specially designated “Indian territory” across the Mississippi River. This difficult and sometimes deadly journey is known as the Trail of Tears.

So get the picture? All men, let alone women, were not created equal in fact despite Jefferson's words which he didn't really believe himself. At best they were aspirational. Well how long do some people have to wait for aspirations to become realized? Joe Biden's administration is trying to correct some of these historical wrongs which go back to the BIG LIE that was embodied in the US Constitution with the flowery words of Thomas Jefferson. Today Trump supporters like Marjorrie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz with their America First tour are only trying to perpetuate the BIG LIES that go back to the beginning of the country. They didn't start with Trump. He only exemplified them, and now Republicans are doing their best to carry on that American tradition.

Off the Top of My Head

The Trouble With Belief Systems

by John Lawrence, March 28, 2021

Belief systems lead to cults. A cult can be defined as a group of people who all fervently believe the same things although there is no objective proof for any of their beliefs. People who believe Trump won the election are members of a cult. People who believe their religion is the only correct and true religion and everyone who does not accept their belief system is going to Hell are members of a cult. A lot of wars have been fought because members of one cult dehumanized members of another cult. The European wars of the 16th century were fought because Catholics and Protestants could not accept that there were people who did not have the same cult beliefs as they did. The 30 years war was a war between Protestants and Catholics. The Crusades were wars between Christians and Muslims. People who hold belief systems fervently cannot accept the fact that there are other people in the world who don't hold their same belief system.

There are some things that are unknowable, at least at this point in time, and they form fertile ground for some one or one to develop a belief system around. Charlatans and manipulators realize that there is money to be made by claiming to assuage peoples' anxieties. One of the biggest unknowables is what happens to us after we die. Another is is there a God or, if there is, is He a judgmental or a loving God? The Founding Fathers of the US, cognizant of the European wars of religion, were mainly Deists. They believed that God created the universe, but was not involved with it after that, the so-called "watchmaker God." Founders who fall into the category of Christian Deists include Washington, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was more influenced by the reason-centred Enlightenment than either Adams or Washington. Jefferson also created his own version of the Bible. This Bible was focused only on Jesus, but none of his mystical works. It didn’t include major scenes like the resurrection or ascension to heaven, or miracles like turning water into wine or walking on water. Instead, Jefferson’s Bible focused on Jesus as a man of morals, a teacher whose truths were expressed without the help of miracles or the supernatural powers of God.

Because of our existential anxiety caused by not knowing what's going to happen to us after death or even in this life, belief systems have grown up and attracted adherents. Fervent belief systems are really cults as they exclude and dehumanize people with alternative beliefs. There is no objective proof, but people are willing to kill those who aren't members of their cult. This is from Britannica:

"Deists argued that human experience and rationality—rather than religious dogma and mystery—determine the validity of human beliefs. In his widely read The Age of Reason, Thomas Paine, the principal American exponent of Deism, called Christianity “a fable.” Paine, the protégé of Benjamin Franklin, denied “that the Almighty ever did communicate anything to man, by…speech,…language, or…vision.” Postulating a distant deity whom he called “Nature’s God” (a term also used in the Declaration of Independence), Paine declared in a “profession of faith”: I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and in endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.''"

The problem with the Trump "true believers" is that they have been sold a bill of goods by those who shamelessly have made money off of feeding this cult a bunch of lies. These people have been conditioned by means of their religion to have a certain set of beliefs which they are willing to fight over. These beliefs coincide with a way of life predicated on an American version of history and an American narrative in which America is a shining city on a hill and a beacon of veracity and truth to the rest of the world. They believe in an America also which is fundamentally white like it's always been in their minds, but that's not the reality any more. American history is not all that noble. Indians were robbed of their lands and Africans were brought here and used as slaves. After they were freed, supposedly, Jim Crow laws made sure that they remained second class citizens. So there is  clash of belief systems. There are those who think the great and noble sentiments expressed by our Founding Fathers should not apply to everyone equally and those who point out the hypocrisy of not doing so.

The problem really is with belief systems which turn into cults. The way forward is really the one expressed by Rodney King: "Can't we all just get along?" With deference to Mission Impossible: your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to make the world a better place for this and future generations without regard to belief systems or ideology. Your vaunted way of life, as perceived to have existed in the past, is irrelevant.

Off the Top of My Head

Going Through Hell ... Twice

by John Lawrence, July 7, 2020

This is what happens when Governors, Mayors and Presidents don't follow the guidelines laid out for them by medical experts and scientific data. Governor Andrew Cuomo did the right thing, and his state is recovering nicely. Trump and his coterie of mainly southern macho men who think they know it all did not, and, as a result, they are ping ponging back and forth - open and shut, open and shut. These A-holes want the economy to sing nicely even if it means sacrificing a few senior citizens. Trouble is COBID has other plans for them. It is still out there, liable to spring up again unless people and political leaders do the right thing and model the right behavior.

Certain parts of the country will recover. New York state proved that. A Democratic governor did do the right thing while Trump and his henchmen were only posturing and talking tough. While they were doing that, Cuomo was demonstrating that New Yorkers were not only tough, but caring, intelligent and loving. That's how he ended his press conferences every day. Trump supporters can yell, "USA, USA" all they want. The fact is that Trump is not making this country great again: He's reducing it to a shit pile. The European Union will not even let Americans travel there. China, which has gotten the pandemic under control, is becoming he undisputed world's number one economy. China is being looked up to by many of our allies, whom Trump has gone out of his way to alienate, while the US is being looked down upon.

Trump can huff and puff all he wants about looters and anarchists and agitators. No one cares any more. Those terms ring hollow. People are waking up to the real American history as found in "A People's History of the United States," by Howard Zinn instead of the fairy tale history we all learned in school. The fact is that America was founded on slavery and theft of Native American lands. According to History.com:

In an era in which the international slave trade was starting to grow, Columbus and his men enslaved many native inhabitants of the West Indies and subjected them to extreme violence and brutality. On his famous first voyage in 1492, Columbus landed on an unknown Caribbean island after an arduous three-month journey.

On his first day in the New World, he ordered six of the natives to be seized, writing in his journal that he believed they would be good servants. Throughout his years in the New World, Columbus enacted policies of forced labor in which natives were put to work for the sake of profits. Later, Columbus sent thousands of peaceful Taino “Indians” from the island of Hispaniola to Spain to be sold. Many died en route.

No wonder his statues are being taken down. He is as much an affront to Native Americans as Jefferson Davis is to African Americans. The Spaniards were just after gold and other riches, and when they couldn't get any more work out of the Indians, they started importing African slaves. Some US states have replaced Columbus Day with Native American Day. At least thirteen states do not celebrate Columbus Day (Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, South Dakota, Vermont, Washington, DC; Wisconsin); South Dakota officially celebrates Native American Day instead.

The point is that all white people are immigrants. My family came here from Europe some 11 generations ago at about the same time the first slave ships arrived. America is a nation of immigrants and the first white settlers did not treat the so-called Indians (a name made up by Christopher Columbus) all that well. Let's acknowledge the real American history and not celebrate murderers and enslavers.