June 19th

Today is Juneteenth.

Juneteenth is when Union Major General Gordon Granger ordered the final enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation in Texas at the end of the American Civil War on June 19, 1865.

Juneteenth is NOT when slavery ended in the US – nor is the Emancipation Proclamation

Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863 ended Slavery in the Confederate States that succeeded from the Union (South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina) and the Confederate Territory of Arizona.

Slavery was STILL legal in the US States of Kentucky, Delaware and in New Jersey (which allowed Chattel Slavery and Indentured Servitude.)

Slavery was made illegal throughout the United States with the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution on December 18, 1865.

Juneteenth, created in 2021, is the first Nationwide Federal Holiday since Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983.