WEBVTT - Francis Scott Key was Kind of a Jerk 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:27.639 Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to 0:00:27.680 --> 0:00:30.880 the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so 0:00:31.080 --> 0:00:33.559 much for tuning in. Oh say, can you see by 0:00:33.640 --> 0:00:37.239 the Don's early light, our super producer, mister Max Williams. 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:43.760 I can't see a thing except Max's glorious visage and hairdo. 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:46.240 Thank you, thank you. 0:00:47.040 --> 0:00:50.360 And that is mister Noel Brown. They call me Ben 0:00:50.520 --> 0:00:54.240 Bullen ed Noel. You know we were you know what 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:58.160 we were referencing here what so proudly we hailed at 0:00:58.160 --> 0:01:01.840 the podcast bright gleaming at It is sort of our 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:04.120 school song here in the United States. 0:01:04.440 --> 0:01:11.360 Fight Fight Fight, fight, fight right right right four. It's 0:01:11.400 --> 0:01:14.720 like some of the House of the Dragon type stuff. Man, Yeah, 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:16.919 I mean it's you know what I guess he's describing. 0:01:17.520 --> 0:01:20.760 Is he describing like war or is it a fireworks display? 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:22.760 I've always been a little ify on what the subject 0:01:22.840 --> 0:01:24.200 matter that song is about. 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:28.960 He is describing the This is funny because we'll see 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:32.920 this in the episode two. He is describing a real 0:01:33.120 --> 0:01:36.400 conflict that he saw. And who is he? You might 0:01:36.400 --> 0:01:40.800 be asking. It's a guy named Francis scott Key since 0:01:40.920 --> 0:01:46.400 nineteen thirty one, our national anthem. The official national anthem 0:01:46.760 --> 0:01:51.320 has been the infamous Star Spangled Banner written by this guy. 0:01:51.960 --> 0:01:56.640 We love national anthems. They're weird, they're frequently controversial. Check 0:01:56.640 --> 0:02:01.680 out our earlier episode on that before we get into it, Ben, 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:05.600 what I think is so delightful and strange about the 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.400 United States is that while the Star Spangled Banner is 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.880 our official anthem, we have a ton of songs that 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:16.560 could be considered unofficial national anthems, like Proud to Be 0:02:16.639 --> 0:02:17.320 an American? 0:02:17.760 --> 0:02:18.400 R No. 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:22.279 Really is that where we are for a certain demographic. 0:02:22.360 --> 0:02:25.280 Bro, Yes, at least I know I'm free to not 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:26.720 like that song very much. 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:29.480 It's one of those songs where and I'm going to 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:31.920 get some heat for this. It's one of those songs. 0:02:32.000 --> 0:02:36.320 Like to me, it's like Benny and the Jets in 0:02:36.360 --> 0:02:41.520 that it doesn't go anywhere melodically, you know. Benny and 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.560 the Jets is kind of this thing for several minutes, 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:46.760 it sort of it just goes and goes. 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:48.840 It does have a bit of a turn. I like 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:51.600 the part where he goes, but Benny and the Jets 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:54.359 that one little part like downward inflection Benny in the 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:56.799 Jets part, But You're right, it doesn't. It's a bit, 0:02:56.960 --> 0:03:00.400 it's slight, it's a minor. It's a minor outon John. 0:03:00.680 --> 0:03:02.680 Yeah, I feel like we're at a one and a half, 0:03:02.720 --> 0:03:04.480 not like banning the Jets. I'm gonna throw my vote 0:03:04.480 --> 0:03:06.080 in here is not liking that one too or two 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:06.880 and a half. 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:10.600 All right, And that's how democracy works. I mean, it's 0:03:10.639 --> 0:03:14.600 no crocodile rock. Okay, let's put it that way. It 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:18.480 is no crocodile rock or circle of it. But I'm 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:21.680 telling you, guys, Proud to be an American is kind 0:03:21.720 --> 0:03:25.920 of like that. But Star Spangled Banner, right, it's a 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:29.760 we're fans of music here. Star Spangled Banner is infamous 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:33.880 for being kind of difficult to sing correctly. There's a 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:37.680 ton of crazy war around the song. A lot of 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:41.200 people and this may surprise some of our non American 0:03:41.280 --> 0:03:46.760 ridiculous historians. A ton of people in the States don't 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:49.160 actually dig the Star Spangled Banner. 0:03:49.480 --> 0:03:53.080 As I saw that, you mentioned that it was much maligned, 0:03:53.160 --> 0:03:55.240 and I guess maybe that that just don't float in 0:03:55.280 --> 0:03:58.320 those circles. But like, who's trash talking the Star Spangled Banner? 0:03:58.360 --> 0:04:00.839 I mean, I would argue it's on its face mid 0:04:00.920 --> 0:04:03.920 at best, but like, is there really a vocal contingent 0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:07.200 out there, like like slandering the Star Spangled banner? 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:12.880 There have been movements to change the US national anthem. Uh, 0:04:13.280 --> 0:04:16.840 this is this is a thing that comes up. It's 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:21.080 it's very it's a very American idea. Right to fix 0:04:21.160 --> 0:04:26.040 the thing, but choicing of grievances, right, But but to 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:29.400 change the banner or the Star Spangled banner would at 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:34.320 this point require Congress, to require an Act of Congress, 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:38.200 and then the President would have to approve it. And 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:42.640 so we're kind of stuck with this legacy idea, and 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:48.320 we're not exploring this anthem in particular in today's episode. Instead, 0:04:48.440 --> 0:04:51.479 we're kind of going behind the music, as it were, 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:55.840 and exploring the story of its creator, Francis, because, as 0:04:55.960 --> 0:04:59.839 ridiculous as it may sound, folks, we are sorry to 0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:03.480 report that Francis Scott Key was kind of a pill, 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:06.200 kind of a heel, kind of a jerk. Not a 0:05:06.240 --> 0:05:09.599 good guy, not the best one. Nothing like if you 0:05:09.680 --> 0:05:13.000 lined up all the guys, I don't think he stopped ten. 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:21.920 Let's get into why, and as you might imagine, it 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:24.279 has something to do with hipocrisy. 0:05:26.200 --> 0:05:28.840 I was drinking coffee and let's spout it out. But yeah, 0:05:28.920 --> 0:05:33.520 that's let's keep that. That's perfect ol our pal. Francis 0:05:34.040 --> 0:05:37.200 is born on August first. He's a fellow August baby. 0:05:37.200 --> 0:05:40.760 It's seventeen seventy nine, so just after what we call 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:45.120 the American Revolution. And he is born at a place 0:05:45.200 --> 0:05:50.120 called Terra Rubra. This sea is in modern day Carroll County, Maryland. 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:54.120 His family is very wealthy. 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:58.039 Yep, yep, you're definitely coming up alongside the swells. And 0:05:58.080 --> 0:06:04.120 that's primarily because his father was a lawyer ross Key, 0:06:03.960 --> 0:06:08.520 also a Continental War veteran and a local judge, and 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:11.080 so he had a bit of a born on third 0:06:11.200 --> 0:06:14.440 kind of upbringing. It afforded him the opportunity to enroll 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:21.480 in Annapolis's in Maryland there Saint John's College. And imagine this, 0:06:22.080 --> 0:06:26.159 at the time, he was only ten years old, which 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:29.400 is crazy. He's a bit of a bit of a prodigy, 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:31.719 I guess right. I mean, if he's calling in college 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:35.279 at ten or is this just specifically a product of 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:40.160 his his privilege? Yeah, before we call him adoogie houser there, 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:43.680 we're not calling him dumb folks, to be clear, but 0:06:43.839 --> 0:06:47.520 we are saying that he had family connections. He is 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:49.920 kind of what we'll call a nepo baby in this 0:06:50.040 --> 0:06:54.240 day and age, because he was studying law under his uncle, 0:06:54.480 --> 0:06:58.040 a guy named Philip Barton Key, who was a British loyalist, 0:06:58.240 --> 0:07:03.640 which was pretty poisonous at this time, you know, post revolution. 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:08.320 I would think, Yeah, he did graduate in seventeen ninety six. 0:07:09.279 --> 0:07:11.600 He was only seventeen years old, so I guess that 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:14.400 means he was in college for seven seven years. That's 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:16.640 a long time. I mean, that's all to me to 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:18.240 graduate college, but I didn't do it right. 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:20.960 Well, he started when he was ten, you know what 0:07:21.040 --> 0:07:23.320 I mean, So he had a lot of catching up 0:07:23.360 --> 0:07:23.520 to do. 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:26.120 He did have a little kit fair. He literally just said, 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:29.240 take this child learned men and turn him into a 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:34.920 learned man. Originally, young Frank yearned, he yearned to breathe 0:07:34.960 --> 0:07:40.000 free and join the Episcopal priesthood. Maybe not free he was, 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:45.240 and this will be darkly hilarious. Later quite the pious 0:07:45.600 --> 0:07:49.880 little lad Francis decided against that. However, possibly I'm the 0:07:49.920 --> 0:07:52.480 advice of his father. Maybe there wasn't you know, there's 0:07:52.520 --> 0:07:56.120 no money in the priesthood. He said, in my imagining 0:07:56.240 --> 0:08:00.240 of this encounter, so he eschewed a spiritual path and 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:04.239 followed the secular moneyed path. Francis went on to study law, 0:08:04.800 --> 0:08:08.760 following the footsteps of Ross his dad, under a judge 0:08:08.760 --> 0:08:12.120 by the name of Jeremiah Townsld. Chase. 0:08:14.120 --> 0:08:18.120 Yes, you can smell the mint Julep's adom. This was 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:22.480 probably again a hookup from his father, Ross Key. Anyway, 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:25.920 it results in our buddy Francis passing the bar. He 0:08:26.040 --> 0:08:30.120 becomes a lawyer in his own right around eighteen oh one, 0:08:30.280 --> 0:08:32.600 So for all of us playing along at home, that 0:08:32.720 --> 0:08:36.760 makes Frank about twenty two years old. Year after that, 0:08:37.080 --> 0:08:40.520 it's New Year's Day and he gets hitched to a 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:45.960 lady named Mary Taylor Lloyd. This is important because Mary 0:08:46.040 --> 0:08:49.480 comes from a family that's even more moneyed than the 0:08:49.600 --> 0:08:54.040 Key family. She is Aristocracy. Her dad is Edward Lloyd 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:59.360 four the fourth. At anytime, anytime somebody gets past the 0:08:59.480 --> 0:09:03.160 third in their name, I always wonder, right if they're 0:09:03.240 --> 0:09:03.920 old money. 0:09:04.280 --> 0:09:06.520 Well, sure you know you don't get a middle name 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:09.920 like Taylo unless you come from some old money either, 0:09:09.920 --> 0:09:12.720 Because at first I thought you had misspoke. No, it 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:16.160 is t a y l Oe not Taylor Taylo. 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:20.920 Yeah, yeah, old money or someone who can't spell or both, 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:26.040 so so not mutually exclusive. There's a ven diagram, there's 0:09:26.040 --> 0:09:29.280 a Van diagram. The United States has proven that time 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:34.240 and time again. So yeah. So this guy Eddie, who 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.240 was kind of a side character in our story, he is, 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:40.440 as we said, he's an elite plantation owner. He was 0:09:40.440 --> 0:09:44.200 a delegate to the Congressional Congress. He himself had married 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:47.320 into a lot of money earlier in life. And at 0:09:47.360 --> 0:09:51.000 this point we talk about this often. In this juncture 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:55.480 of history, the United States is still trying to figure out, like, hey, 0:09:55.640 --> 0:09:59.160 how does an upper crust work in our new nation 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:04.839 which is ostensibly founded upon meritocracy. So they're saying, look, 0:10:05.080 --> 0:10:09.320 these public proclamations of equality and liberty, they're great for 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:12.320 the press, they're great for the larger public and the 0:10:12.360 --> 0:10:15.680 hoi poloi. But then privately, these folks who go to 0:10:15.720 --> 0:10:19.800 the Congress, and these folks who have these big decision 0:10:19.840 --> 0:10:23.600 maker meetings, they get together in back rooms and they 0:10:23.880 --> 0:10:29.600 all feel something akin to a later concept of social Darwinism. 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:32.960 Do as I say, not as I do, A bit 0:10:33.080 --> 0:10:36.760 of a who's got time for all? That this is 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:37.280 for others for others. 0:10:37.520 --> 0:10:42.439 Yeah, yeah, they don't want to publicly call themselves aristocrats 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:46.240 or royalty, but they very much privately agree that some 0:10:46.360 --> 0:10:50.360 people are just better than others. So that's the the 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:53.720 echelon the sphere in which Francis Scott. 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:58.280 Key is moving, planting the seeds for further elitism. He 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:01.720 did have his whole life path kind of set before him. 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:07.079 He is living high on the socioeconomic hog, coming from money, 0:11:07.120 --> 0:11:10.520 marrying rich. He didn't have to do a thing if 0:11:10.520 --> 0:11:12.920 he didn't want to. He could have rested on his 0:11:13.080 --> 0:11:16.760 laurels there his family fortune for the rest of his life. Possibly. 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.920 They did have quite a few kids. Eleven if I'm 0:11:19.920 --> 0:11:21.640 not mistaken, Ben, Yeah. 0:11:21.480 --> 0:11:24.800 Eleven kids is a lot even back then. And Francis 0:11:24.880 --> 0:11:28.280 and Mary were also living in an expensive neighborhood. They 0:11:28.280 --> 0:11:32.679 relocated to the Georgetown area of Washington, d C. 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:36.080 Still fancy, right, very much so, even. 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:41.680 More now, And they were residing this I almost say coven. 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:47.880 I shouldn't say coven, this large collection of children. They 0:11:47.920 --> 0:11:51.800 were in the Key House, which is now a famous 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:57.040 part of Georgetown. Look again, we kind of overemphasized this, folks. 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:01.240 Francis Franny whatever you want to call him. He is 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:06.160 a clever guy. Fran Man, Yeah, the frand Reno. This 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:14.040 is pardon us key to really understanding the dissonance at 0:12:14.160 --> 0:12:17.079 play and why we think he's, you know, kind of 0:12:17.160 --> 0:12:17.839 a pill. 0:12:18.000 --> 0:12:20.120 A bit of a pill. Like any young man, he 0:12:20.320 --> 0:12:23.239 had his share of folks he looked up to the 0:12:23.320 --> 0:12:27.520 rock stars of the day, chief of those, the equally 0:12:27.840 --> 0:12:33.000 morally complicated Thomas Jefferson, who we've discussed at length. Got 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:36.199 to remember that Francis was born after the actual action 0:12:36.320 --> 0:12:38.479 of the revolution, so he was too young to experience 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:41.320 any of that firsthand. But he came up in the 0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:45.080 aftermath of this new nation, and like the very young nation, 0:12:45.440 --> 0:12:49.600 continues to be relatively young compared to other civilizations. Francis 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:53.880 was also grappling with sort of an existential crisis. How 0:12:53.920 --> 0:12:58.959 could a country, the champion liberty and equality also practice 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:02.360 industrial scale and laveman of other human beings? What a quandary, Ben, 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:05.439 What a quandary? How do you reconcile these things? 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:12.280 I didn't, not really, not successfully, because majority of his 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:17.199 adult life Francis was always trying to tread some sort 0:13:17.240 --> 0:13:21.559 of moral middle ground and put diplomatically, he had a 0:13:21.679 --> 0:13:25.240 best mixed results. I mean, you can, of course see 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:31.240 his legal career in DC. Luckily nepotism aside. He was 0:13:31.320 --> 0:13:35.920 quite a talented lawyer. He was known as an extraordinary orator. 0:13:36.280 --> 0:13:38.719 He was blessed with what the Irish and you know 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:42.959 will call the gift of gab. To his credit, he 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:48.920 argued against the Irish Actually, okay, all right, I'll write 0:13:48.960 --> 0:13:54.800 to the ambassador to credit oh right, to the President 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:58.000 of Ireland, because I want an excuse to talk about 0:13:58.000 --> 0:14:01.400 his dog. Have you seen those clips of the president? 0:14:02.040 --> 0:14:03.640 Is it a cute Is it a cute boy's cute? 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:06.439 Kind of a ceremonial position. I don't know if the 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:10.040 guy is still president, but he is most well known 0:14:10.320 --> 0:14:19.360 for taking his dog with him everywhere. So he's giving 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:23.920 he's given serious speeches, and the dog is always next 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:26.560 to him, like sniffing the treats in his pocket. 0:14:26.720 --> 0:14:29.840 Anyway, it's a Bernice Mountain dog. 0:14:31.200 --> 0:14:35.240 Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a big boy, uh Max with 0:14:35.280 --> 0:14:36.160 the facts. 0:14:56.800 --> 0:14:59.520 Yes, indeed, well, and to keys credit, if we're going 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:00.960 to give him, we're going to give it to him 0:15:01.000 --> 0:15:06.600 now publicly at least. He argued against enslavement as a concept. 0:15:07.040 --> 0:15:12.200 Yeah ye, And he even defended enslaved people in court. 0:15:12.240 --> 0:15:15.760 As a matter of fact, in eighteen twenty five, he 0:15:15.840 --> 0:15:20.600 explicitly stated, by the law of nature, all men are free. 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:23.840 And he went all the way to the Supreme Court 0:15:23.960 --> 0:15:28.120 to go to bat for some people who wanted manumission, 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:32.680 wanted emancipation. But the thing is, folks, we're making him 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:34.760 sound really good, and like we said, it's important to 0:15:34.760 --> 0:15:37.720 get give credit where due. The thing is. In his 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:42.680 personal life, Francis was the opposite of an abolitionist. This 0:15:42.760 --> 0:15:46.920 dude literally owned slaves himself. When he was twenty two 0:15:47.000 --> 0:15:51.960 years old, he bought his first enslaved person. By eighteen 0:15:52.040 --> 0:15:56.480 twenty he owned wish wish again, no less than six 0:15:56.680 --> 0:16:01.960 human beings. So like the sheer hypocrisy, the profound paradox 0:16:02.440 --> 0:16:05.480 of going all the way to the Supreme Court of 0:16:05.520 --> 0:16:09.120 the United States to argue for freeing people and then 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:13.000 heading home and going, well, you know not you guys though, right, 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:15.119 like not not the six. 0:16:14.920 --> 0:16:18.400 Of you, No, no, because that would be convenient for me, 0:16:19.920 --> 0:16:24.400 right exactly, how was gonna do all the chores? Guys? 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:27.360 You get it? Like I can't cook, you know what 0:16:27.400 --> 0:16:27.720 I mean? 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:31.880 So I don't do baseboards. No, this is sorry. 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:39.240 About your life. 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:42.240 He did arguably try to make a difference. We know 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:47.200 he held something this complicated. We know he held something 0:16:47.560 --> 0:16:52.360 like anti slavery views because he was a co founder 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:56.920 of a group called the American Colonization Society, and they 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:59.239 saw themselves as very progressive. 0:17:00.160 --> 0:17:02.880 See how you could claim to have anti slavery views 0:17:02.920 --> 0:17:05.280 while simultaneously on these slaves and these things just do 0:17:05.400 --> 0:17:08.960 not track. It doesn't really you know, you know again, hypocrisy. 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:12.320 It just could screams do as I say, not as 0:17:12.359 --> 0:17:17.560 I do, And it really is giving image over reality. 0:17:18.760 --> 0:17:23.800 Very much. So his crew, the ACS American Colonization Society, 0:17:24.200 --> 0:17:28.600 founded in eighteen sixteen, had had a whole pitch that 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:32.760 they thought was edgy and radical and very much a 0:17:32.800 --> 0:17:35.800 greater good thing. They said, here's what we should do. 0:17:36.400 --> 0:17:39.520 We should take everybody who, by hook or by crook, 0:17:40.000 --> 0:17:44.480 has been enslaved and then later freed, and we should 0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:48.680 let them stay free, because we think that's fundamentally the 0:17:48.800 --> 0:17:52.400 right thing to do. But we should also ship them 0:17:52.440 --> 0:17:56.640 the hell out of the United States. We'll make special colonies. 0:17:57.000 --> 0:18:01.080 We'll make colonies where we segregate them on the African continent. 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:04.679 I mean it's sort of like, you know, administrations in 0:18:04.880 --> 0:18:07.800 different local areas and in the United States and Canada 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:11.359 dealing with the unhoused problem by shipping them elsewhere. 0:18:12.200 --> 0:18:15.320 Oh yeah, yeah, Hawaii had a big problem with that too. 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:19.760 A lot of them get shipped to Vancouver, which is 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:22.119 a real tough place because of that. 0:18:22.920 --> 0:18:26.760 Yeah, and let us not forget that in our home 0:18:26.880 --> 0:18:30.399 HQ of Atlanta, Georgia, when the Olympics came in, a 0:18:30.520 --> 0:18:34.920 lot of unhoused people got one way bus tickets. This 0:18:34.280 --> 0:18:38.439 is this was then is now seen as a moral 0:18:38.840 --> 0:18:41.520 middle ground. They said, Okay, we're going to hold true 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:44.639 to the letter of the American law that all people 0:18:44.680 --> 0:18:47.159 are created equal, but we're still going to bend the 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:53.880 need to this patriarchal agrarian system. And obviously folks mixing 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:58.320 the races, mixing the races here in the eighteen hundreds, 0:18:58.359 --> 0:19:01.000 that is uncivilized. 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:02.360 Isn't that That's why they used a really gross term 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:07.000 for that, ben wasn't it misiingen imagination. Yeah, it just 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:09.800 has it's icky mouthfield to it. Just you can tell 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:10.440 that it's bad. 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.439 Yeah, I mean, it's kind of like how early in 0:19:14.480 --> 0:19:17.320 the career of this show, you and I learned that 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:22.720 Oregon never allowed slavery, not because they believed in equality, 0:19:22.800 --> 0:19:26.720 but because they were so racist. They genuinely hated. The 0:19:26.760 --> 0:19:30.240 idea of black people living in their area in any form. 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:33.120 Still blows my mind and blows the minds of most 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:35.880 people I share this with at parties because we're fun 0:19:35.920 --> 0:19:39.679 there that you know, Oregon was founded as like this 0:19:39.880 --> 0:19:46.000 white soulenly paradise, kind of intentional anti black community, especially 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:48.720 given what people know about Portland and it being so 0:19:48.960 --> 0:19:54.679 kind of stereotypically let's call it liberal. A lot of 0:19:54.720 --> 0:19:57.479 the rest of the state very much still to this 0:19:57.600 --> 0:20:01.480 day quite backwards, and often is the home of a 0:20:01.600 --> 0:20:05.280 breeding ground for a lot of white supremacist groups. Yeah. 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:08.240 I find it interesting because one place that is not 0:20:08.359 --> 0:20:11.000 surprised about that fact are people in Portland. 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:11.359 People. 0:20:12.040 --> 0:20:15.120 Oh yeah, you get outside of Portland. It's a it's 0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:17.439 a it can change, it changes very fast. 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.280 I mean, it's not that far off from Atlanta being 0:20:20.320 --> 0:20:23.600 sort of a liberal bastion in Georgia, you know, surrounded 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.480 by not no casting any e spersions on the people 0:20:26.520 --> 0:20:29.200 of Georgia. But it is a very different world out there. 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:31.920 Well to jump to follow up on this, I mean, 0:20:31.960 --> 0:20:34.040 I don't know if this is africane anywhere, but part 0:20:34.040 --> 0:20:36.280 of the state at one point was trying to quit 0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:38.480 Oregon and join Idaho. 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:38.879 Idaho. 0:20:39.080 --> 0:20:42.679 They disagree with the views of Portland, but since Portland 0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:46.199 is such a large population center of the state, it 0:20:46.200 --> 0:20:48.960 has kind of like a controlling basis for how the 0:20:49.000 --> 0:20:52.000 state votes, and so they were trying to seceed from Oregon. 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:55.720 And it wasn't just the population aspect. It was also 0:20:55.760 --> 0:20:59.480 the fact that Portland is an economic powerhouse in the region. 0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:05.320 And I remember my first time in Portland being in 0:21:05.440 --> 0:21:11.240 an interracial relationship. I was confused, frankly by the racism. 0:21:11.480 --> 0:21:13.960 I didn't get some of this stuff, like why is 0:21:14.000 --> 0:21:17.840 that lady spitting at us in the street? Is she okay? 0:21:18.359 --> 0:21:21.959 Is she sick? No, she was just sick of us. 0:21:22.359 --> 0:21:25.280 A story for another day. But if we go back 0:21:25.320 --> 0:21:29.600 to Francis Scott Key, we know that free people of 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:35.400 color in the United States activist and activist and orators 0:21:35.480 --> 0:21:40.879 and so on. They predictably hated the American Colonization Society. 0:21:41.520 --> 0:21:44.159 They said it was an op and black leaders of 0:21:44.200 --> 0:21:48.280 the equality movement thought leaving the country was beat me here, Max, 0:21:48.400 --> 0:21:54.520 bullshit full stop. So this dude, Francis, of course, is 0:21:54.560 --> 0:21:58.760 one of those guys who probably doesn't get told no 0:21:59.520 --> 0:22:01.919 very often, and except that time, his dad wouldn't let 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:05.080 him be a priest. So he is a silver spooned, 0:22:05.520 --> 0:22:09.320 silver tongued lawman, and he is convinced he has the 0:22:09.400 --> 0:22:13.439 right way to tackle chattel slavery. He says, Okay, what 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:17.320 we do is we can't just free everybody, right, We've 0:22:17.359 --> 0:22:21.560 got to gradually dial it down, you know, like quitting 0:22:21.880 --> 0:22:25.840 coffee or something, or quitting caffeine. And the implicit statement 0:22:26.000 --> 0:22:29.000 was you don't have to go back to the plantation, 0:22:29.359 --> 0:22:34.280 but you can't just live here at this point too. 0:22:34.400 --> 0:22:37.760 This is interesting. Everybody is thinking of this guy as 0:22:38.880 --> 0:22:41.879 a hotshot lawyer. Nobody is thinking of him as a 0:22:41.920 --> 0:22:43.280 songwriter or a poet. 0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:48.920 Not yet, and they may never potentially, although it would 0:22:48.920 --> 0:22:52.800 seem that some of his hookups and family connections are 0:22:52.840 --> 0:22:56.760 what led him to be jumped up, as they say 0:22:57.040 --> 0:22:59.879 in the song of Ice and Fire Universe. 0:23:00.359 --> 0:23:03.760 Yes yeah, yeah, yeah, as a jumped up hedge nights 0:23:03.760 --> 0:23:08.159 you know, yeah, yeah yeah. So let's pause for a 0:23:08.200 --> 0:23:10.600 second in this narrative and get to what he is 0:23:10.800 --> 0:23:14.119 most well known for today, which is not law in 0:23:14.560 --> 0:23:15.800 or lawyering. 0:23:15.520 --> 0:23:15.840 But it. 0:23:17.320 --> 0:23:21.679 Is the notoriously difficult to seeing star spangled banner because 0:23:22.000 --> 0:23:24.600 he has jumped up like you're saying, Noel. He is 0:23:24.640 --> 0:23:28.280 a mover and a shaker, which means that at this 0:23:28.280 --> 0:23:31.320 point in American history, as part of the upper crust, 0:23:31.680 --> 0:23:35.480 he functions as a fixer, right, a guy who can 0:23:35.720 --> 0:23:40.119 use his connections through unofficial channels to make stuff. 0:23:39.840 --> 0:23:42.200 Happen, for sure, and he does just that. In early 0:23:42.280 --> 0:23:44.879 September of eighteen fourteen, after the British had burned the 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:48.800 city in the city of Washington, Key was sent on 0:23:48.960 --> 0:23:53.600 a quite potentially dangerous mission to the British fleet near 0:23:53.840 --> 0:23:58.640 Baltimore in order to negotiate for and secure the release 0:23:58.720 --> 0:24:01.760 of a friend of his by the name of William Beans, 0:24:01.960 --> 0:24:05.840 a real stand up guy. William Beans a physician from 0:24:05.920 --> 0:24:10.920 Upper Marlborough, Maryland. Bean's family and friends hope the Key, 0:24:11.040 --> 0:24:13.880 who was then a of course, a prominent attorney in Washington, 0:24:14.200 --> 0:24:20.120 would be able to accomplish this task getting his release secured. 0:24:20.880 --> 0:24:23.879 Yeah, because his family wasn't able to make stuff happen. 0:24:24.119 --> 0:24:27.520 They were perhaps not as connected as he was. So 0:24:28.000 --> 0:24:31.880 France's partners up with an army colonel from the US 0:24:32.000 --> 0:24:34.840 named John Skinner, and then they get the you know, 0:24:34.880 --> 0:24:38.920 the go ahead from the President at the time, James Madison. 0:24:39.440 --> 0:24:44.160 So Skinner and Francis meet the British at the Potomac 0:24:44.240 --> 0:24:48.160 River on September seventh, and they the British are aboard 0:24:48.280 --> 0:24:52.960 a ship called the todtet T NNA and t they 0:24:53.000 --> 0:24:57.160 go into a negotiation. It's very civil, it's very fancy, 0:24:57.320 --> 0:25:02.479 you know, sharing wine or whatever. And these two British guys, 0:25:02.760 --> 0:25:07.960 General Robert Ross, because I'm a grown man who can vote, 0:25:07.960 --> 0:25:11.400 I'm gonna do my best not to laugh. Another British 0:25:11.480 --> 0:25:12.840 guy whose name is. 0:25:12.840 --> 0:25:15.480 George Cockburn, he really needs to get that looked at. 0:25:16.520 --> 0:25:19.880 I'll titter enough for both of us. Cockburn was, of course, 0:25:19.920 --> 0:25:22.280 as you point out, Ben, in the research document, these 0:25:23.080 --> 0:25:27.640 top notch research document for this episode, a rear admiral 0:25:29.000 --> 0:25:34.600 I think that we can vote, and Ben, I disagree. 0:25:34.640 --> 0:25:37.160 The jokes don't write themselves. 0:25:39.359 --> 0:25:43.479 It's a rear admiral. Oh my gosh, it's funny. 0:25:44.080 --> 0:25:46.960 Sorry, but but stuff. 0:25:47.880 --> 0:25:48.960 We're keeping it all. 0:25:48.840 --> 0:25:52.000 In So, boy, are we ever we're having big, big 0:25:52.040 --> 0:25:55.040 Friday energy on a Thursday. Just so. 0:25:55.520 --> 0:25:59.920