The NAACP dubbed “Lift Every Voice and Sing” as the Black national anthem in 1919. The decision came more than a decade before “The Star-Spangled Banner” was adopted as the national anthem ...

At age 5, Aquil Sudah first heard the “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” or as he prefers to call it, the Black National Anthem. The hymn, written by James Weldon Johnson and composed by J. Rosamond ...