This Land Is Our Land - Irving Berlin & "God Bless America"
http://www.morerootsofbob.com/Songs/GBA/gba.html
Actually this one was first intended to be about Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" and it's relationship to Irving Berlin's "God Bless America" but it has turned into the early history of the Berlin song with only some short remarks about Guthrie, so I hope it's of interest and please feel free to criticize and to comment.
I must admit that I had never problems understanding "God Bless America" and what it's all about. One need only to know of Berlin's personal background and the historical context. And I always wondered why nearly always there is this note attached to "This Land..." that it was written as a response to Berlin's song as if it was some heroic deed. But what bothers me more and more is the way Guthrie biographers treat Berlin. There is no appropriate research into the background of that song and the usually short comments about "God Bless America" are nearly libelous and more or less absurd.
There is for example this short text from Ed Cray's biography:
“Guthrie had written [the song] while hitchhiking in the wintry February of 1940. For weeks the sometime dust bowl refugee and ever restless Okie had listened to the jukeboxes and Kate Smith booming the saccharine ‘God Bless America’. Maybe the almighty had or would sometime in the future, but He had missed the America Guthrie knew, the sharecroppers, the boomers, the kids living in ditches alongside California’s rural roads. There was something too pat, too smug about Irving Berlin’s patriotic plea”
This - especially the note about the "poor kids" - is of course pure propaganda and Cray tries to put it on a moral plane: Berlin, the millionaire is not interested in the poor and what's happening in America while heroic Woody really cares. But then there are facts. Some people of course know the story that Berlin has given all the royalties of "God Bless America" to the Scouts. But it is rarely mentioned that he gave them especially to take care of kids in poor parts of the town and for non-sectarian and "non-racial" activities. So may I assume that it was actually Berlin who thought about the poor kids while Guthrie - as I have learned from reading the biographies - was often enough not even willing to support his own kids and he wrote his "answer" in New York in 1940 when he again had left his wife & kids sitting in some shack in the wilderness to travel through the country? Or do I get something wrong?
Another point that I don't understand is: why is Berlin's song singled out for being "uncritical"? A patriotic song is per definitionem “uncritical” and celebratory. It is no sociological thesis. It’s aim is to get the people together, to invoke a feeling of community. This is usually achieved by stressing and celebrating the positive traditions and this is exactly what Berlin had done. And Berlin was smart enough to know that it is better to say what he's for instead of saying what he's criticizing and to make it short and concise. How many people do know the critical verses of "This Land Is Your Land"? And some may remember what happened to Bruce Springsteen's "Born In The USA" when it was hijacked by - if I remember correctly - Reagan and misunderstood as a simple-minded patriotic statement.
Nora Guthrie once claimed that “because her father was born in America, in Oklahoma, he developed a more critical view of the country than an immigrant like Irving Berlin: ‘He [i.e. Guthrie] was born to question and critique; to look at and explore the whole concept of citizenship whereas the immigrant generation is so grateful to be here, to make it better and to celebrate their lifes here. It’s just a different perspective [...]’”. Are songwriters really more "critical" because they were born in the USA? Is a songwriter "uncritical" because he was not born in the USA. Does a songwriter's quality depend on how many "critical" songs he writes.
I happen to know so much of European history to understand that many immigrants - especially those from Eastern Europe like Berlin - did not come to the USA "to make it better" but first and foremost to escape oppression, persecution and anti-Semitism, very simply to save their existence. It’s not possible to understand "God Bless America" without being aware of the fact the Berlin himself came to America from pogrom-ridden Russia and that he had revised and published it in face of massive anti-Semitism in Germany in the 1930s. Berlin’s vision of America - and “God Bless America” was a very personal and very political song - as the last harbor of freedom, as a land “fair” and “free” was true in a very elementary way, especially for those who had escaped oppression and persecution in Europe - both in the 19th century and then again in the 1930s - and for whom America was the last resort.
Anybody who is doing some research into Berlin's background and the song's history (for example simply by checking contemporary newspapers) should be able to find out that Berlin in the 30s and 40s was among the politically most active and most courageous popular songwriters. He was member of anti-Nazi organizations, he was busy working for religious and ethnic tolerance etc. And “God Bless America” was at that time a very political and progressive song. It was the song of anti-totalitarian, internationalist and democratic America, the song of those who were calling for stronger measures against Hitler and more support for Britain (and it's interesting to see that for example Berlin managed to put pro-England and anti-Hitler songs on prime-time radio at a time when Woody, Pete Seeger and friends were actually demonstrating and fighting against Roosevelt's pro-England and anti-Hitler policy), of those who stood for ethnic and religious tolerance and against racism. criticism against Berlin mostly came from the right side of the political spectrum.
Most people are not aware today that Berlin's work had a political and social dimension. He of course received tons of awards etc but some were very specifically "because his songs have been ‘an expression of better understanding for all races, creeds and religions for over a quarter of a century’” or for his “contributions [...] in the theater world that have advanced the aim of the conference [i.e. the "National Conference Of Jews And Christians", an organization Berlin was associated with] to eliminate religious and racial frictions”. And obviously he managed to do this without writing a boring protest song every other day.
It is not my point to criticize Guthrie, although I must admit that my respect for today's "Guthrie camp" has sunk to an all-time low and my admiration for Berlin has grown more and more. But why is Berlin today widely treated as some simple-minded flag-waving Grandpa - something that he never was - and why doesn't he receive the respect he deserves?
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