This one is on the house, Chris.
This a response to a post from Chris so if you feel like learning something read on, if not just skip over this.
The Pledge of Allegiance was Written in 1892 by a leading Christian socialist, Francis Bellamy, who was fired from His Boston ministry for his sermons depicting Jesus as a socialist. Bellamy penned the Pledge of Allegiance for Youth 5 Companion, a magazine for young people published in Boston with a circulation ofabout 500,000.A few years earlier, the magazine had sponsored a largely successful campaign to sell American flags to public schools. In 1891 the magazine hired Bellamy-whose first cousin Edward Bellamy was the famous socialist author of the utopian novel Looking Backward-to organize a public relations campaign to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s discovery of America by promoting use of the flag in public schools. Bellamy
gained the support of the National Education Association, along with PresidentBenjamin Harrison and Congress, for a national ritual observance in the schools, and he wrote the Pledge of Allegiance as part of the program’s flag salute ceremony. Bellamy thought such an event would be a powerful expression on behalf of free public education. Moreover, he wanted all the school children of.America to recite the pledge at the same moment. He hoped the pledge would promote a moral vision to counter the individualism embodied in capitalism and expressed in the climate of the Gilded Age, with its robber barons and exploitation of workers. Bellamy intended the line “One nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all” to express a more collective
and egalitarian vision of America. ellamy’s view that unbridled capitalism,
materialism and individualism betrayed America’s promise was widely shared in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Many American radicals and progressive reformers proudly asserted their patriotism. To them, America stood for basic democratic values--economic and social equality, miss participation in politics, free speech and civil liberties, elimination of the second-class citizenship of women and racial minorities, a welcome mat for the world’s oppressed people. The reality of corporate power, right-wing xenophobia and social injustice only fueled progressives’ allegiance to these principles and the struggle to achieve them. people are unaware that much of our patriotic culture including many of the leading icons and symbols of American
identity-was created by artists and writers of decidedly left-wing and even socialist
sympathies. A look at the songs sung at post-9/11 patriotic tribute events and that
appear on the various patriotic compilation albums, or the clips incorporated into film
shorts celebrating the “American spirit,” reveals that the preponderance of these originated in the forgotten tradition of left-wing patriotism.Begin with the lines inscribed on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Emma Lazarus was a poet of considerable reputation in her day, a well-known figure in literary circles. She was a
,strong supporter of Henry George and his “socialistic” single-tax program, and a .Friend of Wllliam Moms, a leading British:socialist. Her welcome written in 1883, was an effort to project an inclusive and egalitarian definition of the American dream.
The words to “America the Beautiful” were written in 1893 by Katharine Lee Bates, a professor of English at Wellesley College. Bates was an accomplished and published poet, whose book America the Beautiful and Other Poems includes a sequence of poems expressing outrage at US imperialism in the Philippines. Indeed,Bates identified with the anti-imperialist movement of her day and was part of progressive reform circles in the Boston area concerned about labor rights, urban slums and women’s suffrage. She was also an ardent feminist, and for decades lived with and loved her Wellesley colleague Katharine ‘Coman, an economist and social activist.. “America the Beautiful” not only speaks to the beauty of the American continent but also reflects her view that us imperialism undermines the nation’s values of freedom and liberty. The poem’s
final words-“and crown thy good with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea -are an appeal for social justice rather than the pursuit of wealth. ManyAmericans consider Woody Guthrie’s song “This Land IsYour Land,” penned in 1940, to be our unoficial national anthem. Guthrie was a radicál with strong ties to the Communist Party. He was inspired to write the song as an answer to Irving Berlin’s popular “God Bless America,” which he thought failed to recognize that it was the “people” to whom America belonged. The words to “This Land Is Your Land” reflect Guthriie’s b i o n of patriotism, support for the underdog and class struggle. In this song Guthrie celebrates America’s natural beauty and bounty but criticizes the country for its failure to share its riches, reflected in the song’s last and least-hown verse:
One bright sunny morning in the shadow By the relief ofice I saw my people. As they stood hungry I stood there If this land was made for you and me. Gutibrie was not alone in combining patriotism and radicalism during the Depression and World,War II.
The Pledge of Allegiance was Written in 1892 by a leading Christian socialist, Francis Bellamy, who was fired from His Boston ministry for his sermons depicting Jesus as a socialist. Bellamy penned the Pledge of Allegiance for Youth 5 Companion, a magazine for young people published in Boston with a circulation ofabout 500,000.A few years earlier, the magazine had sponsored a largely successful campaign to sell American flags to public schools. In 1891 the magazine hired Bellamy-whose first cousin Edward Bellamy was the famous socialist author of the utopian novel Looking Backward-to organize a public relations campaign to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s discovery of America by promoting use of the flag in public schools. Bellamy
gained the support of the National Education Association, along with PresidentBenjamin Harrison and Congress, for a national ritual observance in the schools, and he wrote the Pledge of Allegiance as part of the program’s flag salute ceremony. Bellamy thought such an event would be a powerful expression on behalf of free public education. Moreover, he wanted all the school children of.America to recite the pledge at the same moment. He hoped the pledge would promote a moral vision to counter the individualism embodied in capitalism and expressed in the climate of the Gilded Age, with its robber barons and exploitation of workers. Bellamy intended the line “One nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all” to express a more collective
and egalitarian vision of America. ellamy’s view that unbridled capitalism,
materialism and individualism betrayed America’s promise was widely shared in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Many American radicals and progressive reformers proudly asserted their patriotism. To them, America stood for basic democratic values--economic and social equality, miss participation in politics, free speech and civil liberties, elimination of the second-class citizenship of women and racial minorities, a welcome mat for the world’s oppressed people. The reality of corporate power, right-wing xenophobia and social injustice only fueled progressives’ allegiance to these principles and the struggle to achieve them. people are unaware that much of our patriotic culture including many of the leading icons and symbols of American
identity-was created by artists and writers of decidedly left-wing and even socialist
sympathies. A look at the songs sung at post-9/11 patriotic tribute events and that
appear on the various patriotic compilation albums, or the clips incorporated into film
shorts celebrating the “American spirit,” reveals that the preponderance of these originated in the forgotten tradition of left-wing patriotism.Begin with the lines inscribed on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Emma Lazarus was a poet of considerable reputation in her day, a well-known figure in literary circles. She was a
,strong supporter of Henry George and his “socialistic” single-tax program, and a .Friend of Wllliam Moms, a leading British:socialist. Her welcome written in 1883, was an effort to project an inclusive and egalitarian definition of the American dream.
The words to “America the Beautiful” were written in 1893 by Katharine Lee Bates, a professor of English at Wellesley College. Bates was an accomplished and published poet, whose book America the Beautiful and Other Poems includes a sequence of poems expressing outrage at US imperialism in the Philippines. Indeed,Bates identified with the anti-imperialist movement of her day and was part of progressive reform circles in the Boston area concerned about labor rights, urban slums and women’s suffrage. She was also an ardent feminist, and for decades lived with and loved her Wellesley colleague Katharine ‘Coman, an economist and social activist.. “America the Beautiful” not only speaks to the beauty of the American continent but also reflects her view that us imperialism undermines the nation’s values of freedom and liberty. The poem’s
final words-“and crown thy good with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea -are an appeal for social justice rather than the pursuit of wealth. ManyAmericans consider Woody Guthrie’s song “This Land IsYour Land,” penned in 1940, to be our unoficial national anthem. Guthrie was a radicál with strong ties to the Communist Party. He was inspired to write the song as an answer to Irving Berlin’s popular “God Bless America,” which he thought failed to recognize that it was the “people” to whom America belonged. The words to “This Land Is Your Land” reflect Guthriie’s b i o n of patriotism, support for the underdog and class struggle. In this song Guthrie celebrates America’s natural beauty and bounty but criticizes the country for its failure to share its riches, reflected in the song’s last and least-hown verse:
One bright sunny morning in the shadow By the relief ofice I saw my people. As they stood hungry I stood there If this land was made for you and me. Gutibrie was not alone in combining patriotism and radicalism during the Depression and World,War II.