Dwandalyn Reece ’85 before the US House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties regarding the history and importance of the hymn “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” Reece is the associate director for curatorial affairs at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. The hymn’s legacy “rests in the pride and inspiration that it brings to African Americans, but also as a meditation on the transformative power that a collective sense of aspiration, perseverance, and hope have in the face of struggle and overcoming adversity,” she says.