Happy Juneteenth everyone!
For those not aware, Juneteenth celebrates slavery coming to an end in the United States, commemorating the date, June 19th, when Galveston, Texas, came under American control. Galveston was the last major rebel territory to have the Emancipation Proclamation come into force.
Branching out from its Texas roots, Juneteenth has become an important date for celebration within the African-American community, and is recognized as a holiday by most US states. In recent times, push for Federal recognition has given the date particular prominence, and this year it has been declared a federal holiday.
In light of this, we felt it appropriate to use the day to highlight some past answers on the subreddit that speak to the history of African-Americans, as well as the struggle to guarantee truly equal rights that continued, and still remains, in the wake of emancipation. If this seems familiar, it's because we also did this last year -- this post is an update of that one.
Below you will see multiple threads that address and highlight African-American history, the continuing fight for equal rights for Black Americans, and the ongoing effort to ensure that, in the words of the enslaver Thomas Jefferson, all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Start off with /u/freedmenspatrol in What recommended sources and resources would you recommend for integrating African American history into history curriculum and fill in my own gaps of knowledge?
/u/Takeoffdpantsnjaket wrote a heartbreaking post about What happened to the Black community in Forsyth County, Georgia, in 1912?
/u/Lyeta explored Did the Women's Suffrage Movement in the United States Include African-American?
/u/hillsonghoods has a number of fantastic posts on the legacy of African-Americans in music history!
And the influence of Bob Marley
u/vpltz takes a look at Josephine Baker became a famous African-American star!
/u/DBHT14 writes about writing about the drawdown of the American military in 1866, and its effect on the regiments of Buffalo Soldier’s who’d fought bravely for the country.
/u/afro-tastic tackled What strategies did the Civil Rights Movement in the US employ?
and u/janvs explains What's the history of Juneteenth? When did it first become celebrated in the Black community in the U.S.?
You may also be interested in this episode of the AskHistorians podcast, in which /u/Drylaw talks with Professor Nicholas Buccola, author of "The Fire Is upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate over Race in America" (Princeton University Press, 2017), about the important 1965 debate on race between James Baldwin and William F. Buckley Jr.
Feel free to add more threads in the comments below!
Last year’s thread also spawned a slew of book recommendations, including:
Biondi, Martha. The Black Revolution on Campus
Dunbar, Erica Armstrong. A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City
Foner, Eric. Forever Free
Foner, Eric. Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men
Foner, Eric. Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution
Glymph, Thavolia. Out of the House of Bondage: The Transformation of the Plantation Household
Higginbotham, Evelyn. Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880-1920
Hunter, Tera. To 'Joy My Freedom: Southern Black Women's Lives and Labors after the Civil War
King, Shannon. Whose Harlem is This Anyway
LeFlouria, Talitha. Chained in Silence: Black Women and Convict Labor in the New South
Oakes, James. Freedom National
Parsons, Elaine Frantz. Ku-Klux: The Birth of the Klan During Reconstruction
Potter, David M. The Impending Crisis
Tompkins Bates, Beth. The Making of Black Detroit in the Age of Henry Ford
Thank you for this!
I do have a question as a non-American.
I’ve only heard of “Juneteenth” for maybe the last two years. When did the moniker “Juneteenth” come into extistence?
Was it always called that, was it known as something else, or is “Juneteenth” a new name for it?
Thank you!
”…came under American control.”
I just want to say thanks for using the correct wording.
Oh, its been around. Here's an ad from 1928 New Orleans Times Picayune
To add a bit more history to /u/jschooltiger's great write-up, for those not familiar with Juneteenth, the recent announcement of the date's designation as a federal holiday likely feels a lit bit out of the blue. However, Black Americans have been advocating for this to happen for decades. The most notable activist is likely a woman named Opal Lee.
From a recent piece on her advocacy efforts:
At the age of 89, Lee decided her new life mission was much like that of Granger: "I knew I just had to spread the word about Juneteenth to everybody." The best way to do that, she figured, was to help get Juneteenth accepted as a national holiday.
She decided to start with a walking campaign in cities along a route from her home in Fort Worth, Texas, to Washington, D.C. It wasn't a straight line. Over several weeks, Lee arrived in cities where she'd been invited to speak and walked 2½ miles to symbolize the 2½ years that it took for enslaved people in Texas to learn they were free.
It's also worth stating the establishing Juneteenth isn't the end of the work around holidays as a symbol. Confederate Memorial Day is an official state holiday in Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina. Kentucky official recognizes Confederate Memorial Day and Jefferson Davis (president of the Confederate states) Day on the same day.
June 19th, when Galveston, Texas, came under American control
Not to seem pedant but which year was that?
We should clarify, though, that not all enslaved people gained their freedom on or before this date. The Emancipation Proclamation only applied within states "in open rebellion."
Slavery continued in the border states that were not covered by the Emancipation Proclamation until the 13th Amendment. In Kentucky and parts of Tennessee, Aug. 8 is the date slaves were told of their freedom. In Delaware, emancipation didn't come until Dec. 6, 1865, when the necessary number of states had ratified the amendment.
Juneteenth as a celebration was known only in East Texas and adjacent states until the mid 20th century. African-Americans who moved to the Bay Area for employment during WWII took the holiday with them to California. The 1968 Poor Peoples Campaign sowed the seeds of a celebration of emancipation among its participants, leading to the geographically curious rooting of big Juneteenth celebrations in Minneapolis and Milwaukee.
I have an additional recommendation for people wanting to think more about public memory and commemoration (especially with Black History). Jeanne Theoharis’ A More Beautiful and Terrible History is great for lay people and historians. Couldn’t recommend it enough. It follows in the tradition of Michel-Rolph Trouillot and should probably enter the canon for Civil Rights history and public history.
So here’s a question. Now that Juneteenth is a national holiday, what is the correct way for whites people to celebrate it?
Why are we calling it a national Independence Day? Don’t we already have a national Independence Day, this day didn’t see any nations becoming independent. Wouldn’t any of the other myriad of names the day has been called be more appropriate?