You're really reaching here, Walter. Folks absolutely ought to mind their own posture while the anthem plays. And I for one respect Kaeperick's courage & convictions. But characterizing the anthem itself as a racist dogwhistle? Because it was scribed by a slave-owner? Frankly I'm not sure what that third verse intends, but it doesn't sound like a pean to slavery. But even so, we don't use it. It's not part of the anthem (which, incidentally, has been popular as a patriotic song well before 1916; e.g. it was adopted by the US Navy in 1889, & actually became the official US anthem in 1931).

There's a taint of guilt by association in the data to which you link. E.g., Scott was Taney's BiL, & that makes the verse he wrote suspect? Incidentally, re Taney, if he was such a stone racist, why did he vote with the SCOTUS majority in freeing Cinque & the Amistad rebels in '41? Furthermore, if you read Dred Scott v Sanford carefully it really only describes the US as it actually was. No slavery in the north ... when it provided principal markets for the cotton, tobacco & sugarcane produced by slave labor? Scott merely ripped aside the veil of hypocrisy that allowed "free states" to feel morally superior to the south.

But that's another argument for another day...

Well written, as usual. But still a reach.