Tomorrow 6/19 is Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day and Emancipation Day. On June 19, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas – home of the most remote enslaved people in the United States – to spread the word that the Civil War had ended and enslaved Black people were free. This happened two-and-a-half years after the Emancipation Proclamation.
It is a reminder to all of us that none of us are free until all of us are free.
Juneteenth has long been a day of celebration, education, and community for Black people in America – and we’re encouraged to see it get the recognition it deserves as a new federal holiday. We also recognize that the struggle is not over – and that the road to a more just, equitable, and sustainable future is long and uneven. It is a reminder to us all that, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., none of us are free till all of us are free.