via Wikimedia
America’s celebration of independence means very little to Black folks. In the words of Frederick Douglass, “What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim.”
It’s why Juneteenth has become such an important holiday in our lives.
January 1, 1863, should have been a day of celebration. The Emancipation Proclamation had been signed into law, after all! But news of slavery’s abolishment didn’t reach all enslaved Black Americans - and this piece of paper meant little to rebels who benefitted from the system of enslavement.
At the most western point of the Confederate States, in Texas, many of our ancestors continued their forced labor, believing to be legally held in bondage. It would take more than two years before freedom became a possibility.
1865 marked the brutal conclusion of the war to end slavery and dismantle the Confederacy. And news of this end finally made its way to Galveston, Texas, on June 19. With hordes of Union troops there to enforce the law, the last enslaved Black people learned of their freedom!
Today, Juneteenth is a time to gather with friends and family to commemorate the truth of our independence. And there’s no better place to celebrate than in Texas, the place where ALL of our people at last gained freedom from slavery.
So let’s gather, yall!
Join the Houston-area PushBlack fam in celebrating Black liberation at the Juneteenth Freedom Festival in Humble, TX this Saturday, June 15th. Tickets are $20.