02/08/24
2/8/2024I don’t remember when or where I learned The National Anthem, or the other American patriotic songs, or The Pledge of Allegiance. I know I was pretty young when I committed them to memory, but I don’t remember the occasions or the process. Nor do I remember whether I learned them in school or in some other venue.
I also don’t remember whether my grade school classes recited The Pledge of Allegiance to open the school day. We may have — maybe some of my classmates can set me straight about that. (We didn’t acknowledge God therein — that part was added in 1954.)
My mom was my Cub Scout den mother, and my dad was my Boy Scout troop scoutmaster. I learned the Cub Scout Motto, the Scout Oath, the Scout Law, the Scout Motto, and the Scout Slogan from them, and they may also have been my teachers for the American patriotic material.
In my childhood Sunday School the religious education director taught us a pledge that we all recited while standing each Sunday morning: “I promise, God helping me, to abstain from the use of alcoholic beverages in any form.” We also learned The Pledge to the Christian Flag, and some of my friends in other denominations learned The Pledge to the Bible.
There was a whole lot o’ pledgin’ goin’ on, and I didn’t think any of it was out of the ordinary. It was just what you did at the time. It was what good patriots, good Scouts, good Christians, and good kids did, in Jefferson in the 1940s and early 1950s. It was part of my family’s culture, and it was knee-jerk automatic.
It wasn’t until later that I learned that in some places not all folks, even in the Judeo-Christian tradition, believed in pledging allegiance (spoken or sung) to a country or its flag, or even in standing while others made those recitations. The youngsters’ obedience to their parents’ wishes cost them friendships, and earned them jeers and worse from their classmates. The beliefs their parents handed down to them violated what their public school required of them, and they paid the price through their classmates’ (and some teachers’) intolerance.
Kids from families in those traditions, and in some other religious traditions as well, would face similar opprobrium in public school under a bill an Iowa House subcommittee passed 2 to 1 and sent to the full House Education Committee a couple weeks ago.
The bill, if enacted by the Legislature and signed by the Governor, would require public school students to open each day by standing and singing one of the verses of the National Anthem. At special events the school could require the singing of all four of the anthem’s verses.
Lots to consider about that.
First, even the first verse is a lot for early grade school youngsters to master. It’s a pretty lengthy stanza, as are each of the other three verses. The melody ranges over 1 1/2-plus octaves, something that challenges the range of most people, let alone children. And how many Americans, young or old, can sing all four stanzas of the anthem?
Second, the meaning of some of the wording, even in the first verse, is beyond the understanding of kids in the early grades. It would be simply committing to rote memory some passages of multisyllabic words whose message would be pretty much lost on them.
And what about those young Iowans whose family religion or belief frowns on singing an anthem about an earthly government?
But wait – there’s more.
The bill that would require singing “The Star Spangled Banner” would also require public school social studies classes to teach “how to love, honor, and respect the national anthem.” It’s not just opening the school day with the song – it’s studying it in class as well.
Since The National Anthem has held an important place in the nation’s history for many decades, it would be a worthwhile object for a school’s history curriculum. That’s no problem as far as I’m concerned.
But the devil, of course, is in the details. The course prospectus should include biographical material about the anthem’s author Francis Scott Key, the circumstances in which he penned the lyrics, the origin of the melody, and the objectives of the Americans and the British in the War of 1812 when Key wrote the piece, in addition to the patriotic values stated within it.
Still, House Study Bill 587, the proposal about The National Anthem, seems to me to be a bridge too far. Most parents probably have no problem with their youngsters learning The National Anthem in school, and probably would have little objection to having them sing it every day as well.
But that’s most parents. Some — for reasons of conscience — would not be happy about it.
And their wishes should be considered. The mantra of state government in Iowa these days is that parents know what’s best for their kids. That’s the argument the state uses to require legislative school appropriations to follow the students, whether to a public school or a private one. It’s what the state has said about vaccination requirements for kids.
The fact that House Study Bill 587 would apply only to public schools, but not to private ones, reinforces that orientation. Apparently only public school students are in jeopardy of flagging patriotism; the bill’s proponents would leave it up to parents of private school students to decide whether to bring their kids up to speed on The National Anthem, whether at school or at home.
If you’re a parent who chooses to send your youngster to public school, you relinquish your right to teach your child your preferred version of patriotism. Under that circumstance, the state’s version of patriotism trumps parental rights.
