Maryland state song may lose the ‘Northern scum’

Descendants of “Northern scum” may find more reason to feel welcome in Maryland if a bill to change the state song passes in the state legislature.

The term is found in the last stanza of “Maryland, My Maryland,” as “Huzza! [Maryland] spurns the Northern scum!” It was penned by James Ryder Randall in April 1861, following the bloody Baltimore Riot between Union and Confederate sympathizers in the first days of the Civil War.