Sentence:  The Negro composer Hall Johnson studied the Americanegro Suite and said of it , `` Of all the many songs written by white composers and employing what <WSD>claims</WSD> to be a Negroid idiom in both words and music , these six songs by Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler easily stand far out above the rest . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  assert or affirm strongly; state to be true or existing