Election 2016: Martin O'Malley, the Confederacy, and the Maryland state song

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Election 2016: Martin O'Malley, the Confederacy, and the Maryland state song

June 23, 2015, 12:17 PM

Martin O'Malley has waded aggressively into the recent debate over the Confederate flag, but he wasn't so vocal about another Confederacy-related dispute that arose in Maryland while he was the state's governor.

But Maryland, too, has its own complicated history with the Confederacy. The state never seceded from the union, but it might have done so absent an intervention by the federal government. Many Marylanders, particularly in the eastern part of the state, were sympathetic to the confederate cause.

That complicated history is reflected in the state's official song, "Maryland, My Maryland," which was adopted in 1939 by the state legislature. The song urges Maryland to secede, referring to Abraham Lincoln as a "despot" and the Union itself as "northern scum." ... "Dear Mother! burst the tyrant's chain," the sixth verse reads. "Virginia should not call in vain."

The song has never erupted into a full-blown controversy like the one currently surrounding the flag in South Carolina. But there have been periodic attempts to change the song's lyrics, most recently in 2009, when then-state Sen. Jennie Forehand, a Democrat, sponsored a bill to do just that.

[Koinos]

1. Laughable to compare a state song that nobody sings anymore

to official public display of the confederate flag.

Changing the lyrics to a song that had only "historical value" (lyrics from a poem written in 1861) was not the governor's nor the legislature's first priority.

Here is some information about one attempt to change the lyrics:

http://somd.com/news/headlines/2009/9393.shtml

According to one sponsor of the bill --

If the words to the song aren't changed, Ivey said, "People will never sing it."

And that is what happened: People never sing it. I am a resident of Maryland, and I have never heard it sung publicly. On the other hand, I am well acquainted with O'Malley's role in making Maryland one of the most progressive states in the US.

And see this post: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6886761