You probably know the tune. It’s that familiar, bouncy melody of "O Tannenbaum"—the Christmas classic about a lovely fir tree. But for 82 years, if you were at a formal event in Annapolis or a Preakness Stakes horse race, those notes weren't about Christmas. They were the backing track for Maryland My Maryland, a song that eventually became so radioactive that the state literally deleted it from the books and left the "State Song" slot blank.
It’s gone now. Since 2021, Maryland hasn't actually had an official song.
Why? Because once you actually look at the lyrics, the "festive" feeling evaporates pretty fast. We’re talking about a song that calls Abraham Lincoln a "tyrant" and a "vandal." It refers to Union soldiers as "Northern scum." Honestly, it’s less of a state anthem and more of a three-minute musical middle finger to the United States government.
The Midnight Poem That Sparked a Battle Hymn
The story starts in 1861. James Ryder Randall, a 22-year-old teacher from Baltimore living in Louisiana, was scrolling through the 19th-century equivalent of a news feed. He read about the Baltimore Riot of 1861, where Confederate sympathizers clashed with the 6th Massachusetts Infantry. His close friend, Francis X. Ward, had been killed in the chaos.
Randall was devastated. He couldn't sleep.
He sat up all night on April 26, 1861, and "dashed off" a nine-stanza poem. It wasn't just a lament for a friend; it was a desperate, screaming plea for Maryland to secede from the Union and join the Confederacy. He published it in the New Orleans Sunday Delta, and it spread like wildfire.
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Why the Christmas Tune?
You’ve got to wonder how a war poem ended up paired with a German carol. A Baltimore woman named Jennie Cary is the one to blame—or credit. She and her sister Hetty were looking for a way to sing the poem at Confederate social gatherings. They tried a few different beats, but "Lauriger Horatius" (the tune we know as "O Tannenbaum") fit the meter perfectly.
It stuck. Confederate soldiers started singing it as they marched into Maryland during the 1862 campaign. Imagine being a Union-loyalist resident of Frederick, Maryland, and hearing thousands of men marching toward you singing about how your president is a "despot" to the tune of a Christmas carol.
The Lyrics That Finally Broke the Camel's Back
For decades, people just ignored the words. Or they only sang the first verse, which is relatively tame if you don't know the context. But the full text of Maryland My Maryland is... intense.
Consider these gems from the original stanzas:
- "The despot's heel is on thy shore": The "despot" is Abraham Lincoln.
- "Avenge the patriotic gore": This refers to the rioters who attacked U.S. troops.
- "Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum!": Not exactly the kind of inclusive language you want at a modern PTA meeting.
- "Sic semper!": The song literally quotes the Virginia state motto ("Thus always to tyrants"), which John Wilkes Booth famously shouted after shooting Lincoln.
It’s kinda wild that it took until 1939 for the Maryland General Assembly to officially adopt it. By then, the "Lost Cause" narrative was in full swing, and many legislators saw it as a way to honor "heritage" without really thinking about what "Northern scum" implied for a state that was, well, still in the North.
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The Long Road to Repeal
People tried to kill this song for forty years. Since 1974, lawmakers introduced bill after bill to either change the lyrics or find a new anthem. They all failed. Some people argued it was a "historical artifact" that shouldn't be erased. Others just liked the tune.
Then 2020 happened.
The racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd changed the political math in Annapolis. Suddenly, keeping a pro-Confederate battle hymn as the official state symbol felt less like "honoring heritage" and more like a glaring endorsement of insurrection.
The Final Vote
In 2021, the Maryland Senate voted 45-0 to repeal the song. The House followed suit with a 94-38 vote. On May 18, 2021, Governor Larry Hogan signed the bill.
He didn't just replace it with a new song. He just... ended it.
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The law literally removed the section of the state code that designated a song. No more "tyrants." No more "vandals." Just silence.
What Happens Now? (The Search for a Replacement)
As of early 2026, Maryland is still effectively "songless." There have been plenty of suggestions, of course. Some people want "The Star-Spangled Banner" since it was written in Baltimore, but that’s already the national anthem, and it's notoriously hard to sing.
Others have proposed new compositions like "The Heart of Maryland" or "Maryland, Our Home." There's even been talk of using "Victory Song" (the University of Maryland's fight song), but that feels a bit too much like a Saturday afternoon at a football stadium for a formal gubernatorial inauguration.
The Maryland State Archives and various commissions have laid out what a new song should be:
- Inclusive: It needs to represent all Marylanders, not just those from one side of a 160-year-old war.
- Short: Nobody wants to stand through nine stanzas of anything.
- Memorable: It has to be actually catchier than a repurposed Christmas carol.
Actionable Insights for History Buffs
If you're interested in the remnants of this musical controversy, you can still find the history if you know where to look.
- Visit the Maryland Center for History and Culture: They hold the original manuscripts of James Ryder Randall’s poem. Seeing the actual ink on paper makes the visceral anger of 1861 feel much more real.
- Check the Legislative Record: You can look up Senate Bill 8 from the 2021 session. It’s a fascinating look at how a state goes about "un-declaring" a symbol.
- Listen to the "Union" version: Most people don't know that Northern supporters wrote their own lyrics to the same tune during the war. It's called "The Rebel Horde is on Thy Shore." It’s basically a diss track written in response to Randall.
The story of Maryland My Maryland is basically a lesson in how long symbols can outlive their original meaning—and how much work it takes to finally let them go. Whether the state ever finds a new song that everyone can agree on remains to be seen. For now, the "Old Line State" is perfectly fine with a little bit of quiet.
To truly understand the impact of the song's removal, research the "Lost Cause" movement of the early 20th century, which is when most Confederate symbols were actually codified into law. Examining the 1939 legislative notes in the Maryland State Archives provides the clearest picture of why the song was adopted so long after the Civil War ended.