Let America Be America Again The free? Who said the free? Not me? Surely not me? The millions on relief today? The millions shot down when we strike? The millions who have nothing for our pay? For all the dreams we’ve dreamed And all the songs we’ve sung And all the hopes we’ve held And all the flags we’ve hung, The millions who have nothing for our pay— Except the dream that’s almost dead today. O, let America be America again— The land that never has been yet— And yet must be—the land where every man is free. The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME— Who made America, Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain, Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain, Must bring back our mighty dream again. Sure, call me any ugly name you choose— The steel of freedom does not stain. From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives, We must take back our land again, America! O, yes, I say it plain, America never was America to me, And yet I swear this oath— America will be! Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death, The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies, We, the people, must redeem The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers. The mountains and the endless plain— All, all the stretch of these great green states— And make America again!
Excerpt from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes
"Let America Be America Again"
is a poem written in 1935 by American poet Langston Hughes
(1902 – 1967) . Hughes was not only a poet but also a social
activist, a novelist, a playwright, and a columnist.
The poem was originally published in
the July 1936 issue of Esquire Magazine. It speaks of the
American dream that never existed for the lower-class American and
the freedom and equality that every immigrant hoped for but never
achieved. In his poem, Hughes represents not only African Americans,
but other economically disadvantaged and minority groups. The poem
also conveys a sense of hope that the American Dream is soon to come
– considering the date of publication, this hopeful attitude seems
ironic.
Like many African Americans, Hughes had
complex ancestry (Ethnicity – African American, White American,
Native American). Both of Hughes' paternal great-grandmothers were
enslaved African Americans and both of his paternal
great-grandfathers were white slave owners in Kentucky. Hughes'
father, James, left his family and later divorced his wife Carrie.
James eventually traveled to Cuba and then to Mexico, seeking to
escape the enduring racism in the United States.
After his
parents separated, his mother traveled seeking employment, and young
Langston Hughes was raised mainly in Lawrence, Kansas by his maternal
grandmother, Mary Patterson Langston. Through the black American oral
tradition and drawing from the activist experiences of her
generation, Mary Langston instilled in her grandson a lasting sense
of racial pride.
(Encyclopedia
of the Harlem Renaissance. 2003.
And The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes. 2002)
During
the 2016 campaign, President-elect Donald Trump used “Make America
Great Again” as his campaign slogan. Hughes poem came to mind in
response to Trump's popular catchphrase. Greatness is surely relevant
to those in the country. But this begs a question.
Was
America ever
great for many of its people – the long-suffering minorities and
underprivileged poor? I believe the answer is “no.” The
disadvantaged have long been denied any redemption of their American
dream. It is 2016, and Trump's use of “again” effectively
overlooks those who have no conception of a past that fitly
recognized them. In 2014, 14.8 percent of all persons in the United States still live in poverty according to the National Poverty Center. Will it worsen?
I do
not believe a billionaire without any remote experience of hardship
and struggle truly intends to fulfill a commitment to these people.
Although many of them have believed his promise to raise the lower
class, I question Trump's understanding of their needs and his true
desire to help them. I cannot see how his platform is designed to
increase the standard of living for these Americans.
Consider
what Donald Trump said while sitting in his Mar-a-Lago mansion in
Palm Beach during an interview with reporter Maureen Dowd ...
''You don't need money to get beautiful women. All my life, I've had friends who were successful and can't get a date, let alone a date with a beautiful woman. I have watched men worth hundreds of millions who have all the trappings -- a G-5 [Gulfstream jet], the Fifth Avenue apartment, the Palm Beach estate, and they cannot get a date. They're sitting at home watching television. They're brilliant all day long and at night, they don't have a clue.
''These people who eat people alive for a living, come 7 o'clock, they see a girl who's a solid 5 -- not supermodels, 10's -- and they look at her in awe, but they develop lockjaw.
''I fixed up a very well-known powerful, rich man with a very nice and very beautiful woman he'd been trying to meet for a year and a half. She called me the following day and said, 'Don't ever do that to me again,' and an hour later he called me and said, 'It was unbelievable. Could you call her and arrange a second date?'
''Ultimately, a woman can't make love to a G-5.
''People believe there's more glamor to being a very wealthy person, but there really is a lot of work. Once, a very rich guy calls me up and asks if I can get him reservations that night for Le Cirque. He can't get in. So I got him in, and he calls the next day and says: 'You got me the best table. But how do you deal with all that publicity?' Look, what's the point of being successful if nobody knows who you are?”
Oh, of
course, Trump's tax plan promises to put more money in the hands of
poor Americans. Under his plan, single people making less than
$25,000 a year and married couples earning less than $50,000 would
pay zero income tax. He says, "Those who would otherwise
owe income taxes will save an average of nearly $1,000 each."
But
...
The
conservative Tax Foundation estimated that Trump's plan would reduce
tax revenues by $11.98 trillion over the next decade. And, it would
increase the national debt by over $10 trillion over the next decade.
And,
Trump is calling for a balanced budget? Mathematically that means
that the GOP will be on the lookout for $6 trillion in spending cuts
over the next decade. And Trump has essentially declared more than
half the budget off-limits for cuts, since he wants to grow the
military and preserve Social Security and Medicare.
“The
test of a new GOP commitment to poverty will be whether it can cut
taxes and balance the budget without deep cuts in some of the
resources available for basic assistance for the poor,” said Robert
Greenstein, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
in Washington.
(Rebecca
Kaplan. “Donald Trump's tax plan would help the poorest Americans.”
CBS News September 30, 2015.)
In the
last eight years, President Barack Obama oversaw the largest growth
in federal spending to reduce inequality since the Great Society of
the 1960s.
His
crusade had three pillars: (1) the Affordable Care Act, (2) tax
benefits in the 2009 stimulus extended throughout the last seven
years that raised the overall income of millions of poor Americans,
and (3) measures going beyond the tax code to increase anti-poverty
spending – food stamps, long-term unemployment benefits, and
support for a higher minimum wage.
Together,
these measures helped to reduce after-tax inequality more than any
administration on record, according to the non-partisan Congressional
Budget Office.
It is
unfathomable, but evidently many poor people voted for the removal of
poverty spending. They actually believed unemployment had increased
under President Obama, when, in reality, the labor market was in its
longest continuous expansion ever, and the last 12 months have been
the best period for wage growth this century.
Derek
Thompson, senior editor of The Atlantic,
said about Trump: “Quite simply, his administration would make it
much harder to be poor in America.”
And, Thompson realistically addresses the result of the Trump tax plan ...
“With protective collars around defense and spending on the elderly, the rest of government spending would have to be bulldozed. This remainder is dominated by assistance for the young and poor. Medicaid would shrink, as might the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Food stamps would be cut. Federal unemployment insurance spending would fall, as would housing and energy assistance for the poor. The Department of Education would have to be gutted, taking federal student loans with it.”
(Derek
Thompson. “Things Are About to Get Much Worse for Poor Americans.”
The Atlantic. November
09, 2016.)
Mr.
Hughes, once more the American dream for the underprivileged seems
destined to be deferred. Although America has gone through great
reforms and social advances since you wrote your poem in 1935, much
of the “rack of ruin” for the poor remains.
Sadly,
it seems a mega-rich shyster has somehow convinced enough of the
less-advantaged that he is a savior, yet, as president, he intends to
provide the highest-income taxpayers with the biggest cuts, both in
dollar terms and as a percentage of income (according to the Tax
Policy Center). And, the richest 0.1 percent of the country is
likely, on average, to save more than $1 million.
And,
all the while, the poor get poorer as this carnival barker brags
about taking a $916 million loss and not paying his taxes for many
years. He continues to extoll the virtues of “making America great
again.” Yet, for the poor, he is just promising to weaken further a country where the land of the free “never has been yet.” God help America to “be.” The dream is still a dream.
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