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HISTORY OF JUNETEENTH
Juneteenth refers to June 19, 1865, the day that Union General Gordon Grainger rode into Galveston Bay, Texas and read Executive Order #3, proclaiming "all slaves are free." Executive Order #3 came two years, six months and eighteen days after the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863 in which President Abraham Lincoln granted freedom to all slaves in the confederate states.
"But, if this part of our history could be told in such a way that those chains of the past, those shackles that physically bound us together against our wills could, in the telling, become spiritual links that willingly bind us together now and into the future - then that painful Middle Passage could become, ironically, a positive connecting line to all of us whether living inside or outside the continent of Africa..."
Tom Feelings
Abolitionist Frederick Douglas wrote "Juneteenth should be more important to Black people than the 4th of July because when the Declaration of Independence was signed, the words did not apply to Black people."
African Americans in Galveston, Texas, received official word that they were free on June 19, 1865, more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation had abolished slavery in the rebelling Confederate states. Juneteenth, painting by Michael Escoffery, 1996.
J -- Juneteenth represents the joy of freedom--the chance for a new beginning.
U -- Unless we expose the truth about the African-American slave experience, Americans won't be truly free.
N -- Never must we forget our ancestors' endurance of one of the worst slave experiences in human history.
E -- Every American has benefitted from the wealth blacks created through over 200 years of free labor and Juneteenth allows us to acknowledge that debt.
T -- To encourage every former slave-holding state to follow Texas' (and Oklahoma's) example and make Juneteenth a state holiday.
E -- Everyday in America, blacks are reminded of the legacy of slavery. Juneteenth counters that by reminding us of the promise of deliverance.
E -- Even on the journey to discover who we are, Juneteenth allows us to reflect on where we've been, where we're at and where we're going as a people.
N -- Never give up hope is the legacy our enslaved ancestors left. It was this legacy that produced black heroism in the Civil War and helped launch the modern civil rights era. It is this legacy we celebrate.
T -- To proclaim for all the world to hear, that human rights must never again become subservient to property rights.
H -- History books have only told a small part of the story; Juneteenth gives us a chance to set the record straight. Juneteenth NJ 2007
Prince Hall |
Prince Hall was the founder of the first black Masonic lodge in the United States. A resident of Boston, he was a leader in the battle against slavery in the years immediately following the American Revolution.
Hall was born in Bridgetown on the Caribbean island of Barbados sometime in the year 1735, the slave of a man named William Hall. His mother was a woman of African and French descent; his father, a European artisan who had been born in England. At about age 17, in 1752, Hall found work and passage on a ship, and made his way to Boston. He lived very much a free man, make a modest living in leather working, the same craft as his father.
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