Many do not know or are even unawares that there are four verses to our National Anthem. Due to time constraints with air time, only the first verse is often sung at major sporting events. Here, for your enjoyment and education, are the FOUR verses to the Star Spangled Banner.
Only with the start of the Civil War did "The Star-Spangled Banner" become a nationally popular song. Both Union and Confederate forces rallied to it. During World War I, a drive began in Congress to make it the official anthem of America's armed forces. There were other contenders for the title, including "America the Beautiful" and "Yankee Doodle." Maryland legislators and citizens were among the most active groups and individuals who pressed to get Francis Scott Key's words and accompanying English tune ratified into law as the country's first national anthem. That finally happened with passage of P.L. 823 and President Herbert Hoover's signature on March 3, 1931.
The anthem has four verses, each ending with the line, "O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave."
The Star-Spangled Banner
Words by Francis Scott Key, (1814) Music by John Stafford Smith (1780)
Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light What so proudly we hail at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad strips & bright stars, through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes, What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep, As it fitfully blows half conceals, half discloses? Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam, In full glory reflected now shines on the stream: Tis the Star-Spangled Banner: Oh, long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion A home and a country should leave us no more? 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.
Oh, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation; Blest with victory and peace, may the heaven-rescued land Praise the Power that hath made & preserved us as a nation. Then conquer we must, when our cause is just, And this be our motto: "In God is our trust" And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph shall wave, O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
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