The Voice on the Steps of Justice

On Easter Sunday, 1939, contralto Marian Anderson stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and opened her mouth to sing. The Daughters of the American Revolution had barred her from Constitution Hall because of the color of her skin. But Eleanor Roosevelt resigned her membership in protest, and the Department of the Interior opened the National Mall instead. Seventy-five thousand people gathered — Black and white, young and old — stretching from the Memorial to the Washington Monument beneath an open sky.

Anderson began with "My Country, 'Tis of Thee," and her voice carried across that vast crowd like something unleashed. Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes introduced her simply: "Genius draws no color line." By the time she sang "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen," grown men were weeping openly.

What the DAR meant as exclusion, the Almighty turned into a stage far grander than any concert hall could offer. A door slammed shut, and God opened the whole sky.

This is the rhythm of Psalm 98. The Lord has "made His salvation known and revealed His righteousness to the nations." When human institutions fail, the Most High does not scramble for a backup plan — He reveals His justice on a scale no one anticipated. The rivers clap, the mountains sing, and sometimes seventy-five thousand witnesses stand in the open air, watching righteousness roll down like Marian Anderson's voice across the Mall.