Background:
The proper name of this date is Juneteenth National Independence Day. It is the most recent federal (national) holiday in the USA, first enacted by then-President Joseph Biden in 2021. It is an annual celebration observed on 19 June (exempt from the Monday holiday policy) to commemorate the formal and official emancipation (freedom) from slavery of the African-American and Indigenous Peoples (Native Americans) in the USA.
The name of this occasion is a combination of the words “June” and “nineteenth” (in the vernacular of the populations freed) because on this exact date, 19 June 1865, Major General Gordon Granger ordered the official enforcement of the declaration of the Emancipation Proclamation of the late President Lincoln. This enactment occurred throughout the entire state of Texas at the end of the U.S. Civil War.
Introduction:
The initial celebrations of this happening began as early as 1866 throughout the state known as Texas. Initially, because of the shortages and financial burdens of the civil war and the Union occupation, the events were in the format of local church sponsored community gatherings often featuring a large communal meal with each family/household contributing a special food. Observances soon spread beyond the borders of Texas and into surrounding former slave-owning states, still limited to the liberated enslaved peoples.
Once the Reconstruction (military occupation and administration of the South by the Union army) Period ended, a period known as “Jim Crow” government (racial oppression and legal segregation) ensued throughout the former Confederacy. During this time, the continued unofficial celebrations of the Juneteenth date were held under the auspices of local churches but gradually expanded from food festivals to include music and dancing.
Juneteenth Expansion:
The exceptionally large number of former slaves and their families continued to live in the South due to limited financial resources and travel availability. The U.S. involvement in The Great War (World War I) in 1917 allowed Blacks a chance to improve their economic circumstances by fighting in France. Following the war ending in 1918, The Great Migration happened with hundreds of thousands of African-Americans moving from the rural Southern sharecropping to Nothern and Western industrial factories and a regular paycheck.
This reality opened the doors to introduction and expansion of Juneteenth festivities to local church communities in both northern and western areas of the U.S. The growth increased awareness of and observances of the occasion and its importance to this particular population. Gradually, among churches, statewide and soon national recognition of this event followed.
The success of the civil rights struggle and the repeal of systemic segregation policies in the 1970s and 1980s, a movement emerged urging support of a Juneteenth official observance. This culminated finally in then President Biden signing into law the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act in 2021.
Juneteenth Myth:
A popular myth/rumor surrounding the earlier observances of the Juneteenth event was the fact that Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses Grant on 9 April, 1865, in the town of Appomattox, Virginia, many hundreds of miles from Texas.
The Southern plantation/slave owners were extremely reluctant to inform their enslaved “property” that they were now free. The myth evolved that the news of the emancipated slaves receiving liberation was only orally repeated from plantation-to-plantation. The Texans were the last to learn of their terminated bondage on 19 June, 1865. Hence the Juneteenth designation.
This word-of-mouth only conveying of the news of freedom from slavery was how many justified the delay in the information of Lee’s surrender to Grant two months earlier.
A Closer Look:
Given the speed of internet, social media and technological marvels, it is almost impossible to comprehend the validity of the myths/rumours of delayed news transmission concerning freedom. However, with the timeline and the reality that the exclusive Southern “upper class” was totally Caucasian, slave-owning and severely financially impacted by the defeat of the rebellious Confederacy, there’s a possibility of some vague truth here.
In addition, the wealth of plantation owners and the upper level of Southern society was frequently based on and measured by the values of those held in servitude. The eradication of slavery as a legality would and did bankrupt an empowered class of that society. Combined with the conclusion of a five-year-long devastating Civil War in which an overwhelming number of battles – and destruction – occurred in the strictly segregated South, this provided circumstances that could lead to some verification of the unsubstantiated Juneteenth myth.
The Unanswered Question:
Why did it take 156 years to designate a holiday to commemorate a major event in this nation’s history? A country that was built for democracy and freedom.
Happy Juneteenth holiday and naked hugs to all!
Roger Poladopoulos/ReNude Pride: Guys Without Boxers!
Author’s Note: The next post entry here is planned for Saturday, June 21, 2025, and the proposed topic is: “Summer, 2025!”
ReNude Pride: Guys Without Boxers! 