Juneteenth: Why We Celebrate, Remember, and Learn From History
Juneteenth: A Daily Reminder of Pain, Freedom, and the Work Still Ahead Juneteenth is more than a date on the calendar. It is more than a cookout, a flag, a parade, a day off, or a social media post. Juneteenth is a reminder, a deep, emotional, necessary reminder, of the years of pain, labor, separation, fear, survival, and resilience carried by African Americans throughout history. It reminds us that freedom did not come easily. It reminds us that freedom was delayed. It reminds us that people were forced to keep working, keep suffering, and keep waiting for a freedom that had already been declared but had not yet fully reached them. That kind of pain does not disappear just because time passes. Juneteenth marks June 19, 1865, when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, were finally informed that they were free. This happened more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation. Imagine that, freedom had been declared, but thousands of people were still living as if...
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