"...I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free... In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed." --from "The Emancipation Proclamation", issued by President Abraham Lincoln & Secretary of State William Seward, Secretary of State, on 01 January 1863.
Juneteenth is a blending of the words "June" and "nineteenth. It is the oldest known US celebration marking the ending of slavery. The day commemorates 19 June 1865, when Union MAJ General Gordon Granger rode into Galveston, Texas, and told the slaves that they had been "emancipated", or freed from slavery.
"In accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free," Granger read and announced to the crowd that day.
This proclamation came nearly two-and-a-half years after Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, as the reader can note here. In 1980, Texas was the first state to make it an official holiday, although it had been informally celebrated since 1865. It became a federal holiday in 2021.
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