The song turns up in Folk Song U.S.A. (1947) by John and Alan Lomax. Here are the full notes and lyrics from the book:

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RAISE A RUKUS

The South was the meeting place of two very musical peoples. There the folk from the British Isles and the folk from the West Coast of Africa pooled their tunes, their rhythmic patterns, and their song-styles. The sharing of songs and the musical competition between these radically different groups gave rise to the most interesting things in American music -- the music of the minstrels, the spiritual, the blues, hot jazz, and, now, hillbilly.

Imagine what happened, for instance, when the fiddler who formed "Sourwood Mountain" or "Old Joe Clark" heard a Negro slave, slapping out an intricate, syncopated rhythm on his thighs and chanting --

JUba dis an' JUba dat an'
JUba killed my YALlow cat, O
JUba,
JUba, JUba, JUba, JUba, JUba....

You may be sure that fiddler slipped out back of the cowshed that night, and tried to "mock" that little song on his instrument. His "Juba" took on a character distinctly different from its original. You can think of scores of tunes that have this flavor: "Cindy," "Old Dan Tucker," "Buffalo Gals," "O Susannah," to mention only a few.

Reverse the situation. The song-leader from the slave quarters stands in the kitchen door and watches an Irish music master play his lively jig tunes, while the white folks swing and turn in a quadrille. He makes himself a one-string fiddle and practices until he can amuse his white master and his guests. Later he gets his hands on an old broken-up fiddle and works hard to learn a few tunes, because he knows that, as plantation fiddler, he can earn release from some of the harder tasks and punishments that now fall upon him.... This is precisely the story of Balaam and hundreds of other slave musicians; and we know that even in colonial times Negro fiddlers were playing for the most elegant balls, as well as for their own dances in the slave quarters.

Out of such competition and emulation came songs like "Raise A Rukus," an ante-bellum Negro hoedown or jig tune with an overlay of minstrel-show influence. In the slave quarters, where no instruments were available, the typically African song leader improvised new lines against an insistent vocal and rhythmic refrain to make dancing music. An ex-slave has described a jigging contest in "the quarters," where songs of this kind began:

Master always wanted to help his colored folks live right, and he always 'ranged for parties and such -- no foolishment, just good, clean fun. There was dancing and singing most every Saturday night. He had a little platform built for jigging contests. Colored folks came from all around to see who could jig the best.

I must tell you about the best contest we ever had. One nigger on our place was the jiggingest fellow ever was. He could put a glass of water on his head and make his feet go like trip-hammers and sound like a snare drum. Now it gets noised around a fellow been found to beat him and a contest was arranged for Saturday evening. There was a big crowd and money was bet.

So they starts jigging. Tom starts easy and gits a little faster and faster and it look like Tom done met his match, but there am one thing he ain't done -- he ain't made a whirl. Now he does it. Everybody holds he breath, and the other fellow starts to make a whirl and he makes it, but just a spoonful of water slops out of his cup, so Tom was the winner.

As background for the bitterly satirical lines of "Raise A Rukus," here is an anecdote from the childhood of Jenny Proctor, Alabama ex-slave:

I recollects once when I was tryin' to clean house like old Miss tell me, I finds a biscuit and Ize so hungry, I et it, 'cause we never see such a thing as a biscuit only sometimes on Sunday morning. Well, she come in and say, "Where's that biscuit?" I say, "Miss, I et it 'cause I'm so hungry."

Then she grab the broom and start beating me over the head with it, and I guess I clean lost my head 'cause I knowed better than to fight her if I knowed anything, but I start to fight her, and the driver comes in and starts beating me with that cat-o'-nine-tails, and he beat me till I fall to the floor. I still got those scars on my back just like my grandmother have when she die, and Ize a-carryin' mine right on to the grave just like she did.

The refrain of this ditty, "raise a rukus tonight," has two meanings: to start trouble, to have fun. This contrast in meanings aptly hits off the dual aspects of the song: a song of protest and irony -- a crazy "black-face minstrel song" which will tickle "the white folks." In this latter guise, the song is known and loved all over the South, both among Negroes and whites. Ironically enough, it is one of the few secular songs that Negro ministers will officially permit their congregations to sing at picnics and church socials.


Raise a Rukus

My ol' mistiss promise me,
Raise a rukus tonight,
When she died, she'd set me free,
Raise a rukus tonight,
Live so long twell her haid got bal',
Raise a rukus tonight,
Give up the notion of dyin' a-tall,
Raise a rukus tonight.

CHORUS:
Come along, little chillun, come along,
While the moon is shinin' bright,
Git on board, down the river float,
We gonna raise a rukus tonight.

My ol' mistiss say to me;*
"Sambo, Ize gwine ter set you free."
But when dat haid get slick and bal',
You couldn'-a killed her wid a big green maul.

My ol' mistiss never die
Wid her nose all hooked an' skin all dry.
But when ol' miss she somehow gone,
She lef' Uncle Sambo a-hillin' up de corn.

Ol' mosser likewise promise me,
When he died, he'd set me free.
But ol' mosser go an' make his will
Fer to leave me a-plowin' ol' Beck still...

All dem 'taters in dat oven,
How I wish I had some of 'em.
All dem biscuits in dat pan --
If I don't get 'em I'll raise some san'.

Way down yonder on Chit'lin' Switch
Bullfrog jumped from ditch to ditch,
Bullfrog jumped from the bottom of de well,
Swore, my Lawd, he'd jumped from Hell.

*In singing this song, be sure to repeat "Raise a rukus tonight" after every line.

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The printed music would also indicate the chorus should be sung after each verse.