I was on twitter and someone joked about how many blacks actually know the Negro National Anthem: Lift Every Voice and Sing. When I was young we performed this song at church functions and in school for special holidays, and we were required to memorize parts of Martin Luther King’s speech, I Have A Dream.

Now, I realize we no longer sing Lift Every Voice, and then it hit me we no longer need our own National Anthem. With the election of President Barack Obama, many blacks finally feel like they are Americans, and they embrace The Star Spangle Banner, sometimes with tears in their eyes unlike years past. The journey has been long and of course it’s not over, as many people have become more vocal with their racial stereotypes and disrespect for the President. But, we no longer have to eat out back, or stand on the bus so that a white person can take our seats, we no longer  have to move off the side walk to make room for whites, we don’t have to use sir or mam to refer to people younger than us, and if our child whistles at a white girl they want be brutally murdered and lynched.

It’s sad that it may be time to say good-bye to a black tradition, but it’s good news that 40 years after the death of America’s peace leader, we have a black President. Now both songs bring tears to my eyes.

Let us march on, til victory is won…

For the land of the free, and the home of the brave…