Juneteenth became a federal holiday... but not everyone agreed, here are the votes

The United States commemorates July 4th as the date it declared independence from British rule. Yet, the liberties gained after the Revolutionary War did not extend to everyone in the new nation.

A hundred years later, the country was torn apart by another war — the Civil War — where Americans fought on opposing sides, one seeking to end slavery, the other to maintain it. The war concluded with the Union’s victory and the abolition of slavery in the United States.

The date that the last slaves in Texas learned that they were free, 19 June, was made a federal holiday in 2021.

Juneteenth vote saw 14 Republicans against

The bill, which was passed overwhelmingly by the US House of Representatives after a unanimous vote in the Senate, marks the day in 1865 when Union Major General Gordon Granger informed a group of enslaved people in Texas that they had been made free two years earlier by President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War.

“Juneteenth marks both a long hard night of slavery subjugation and a promise of a brighter morning to come,” Biden said. He said the day is a reminder of the “terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take.”

“Great nations don’t ignore their most painful moments...they embrace them.”

Not everyone was in favor, however, as 14 House Representatives voted against the Juneteenth bill.

Three years on, and with an election getting closer and closer, there are concerns that not enough has been done to deal with issues black Americans face.

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“It’s important to commemorate emancipation and to encourage everyday Americans to reckon with the history of slavery ... but there is always a danger with these sort of things so they can be performative,” said Matthew Delmont, a professor of history at Dartmouth College who specializes in African-American history and civil rights.

Designating Juneteenth a federal holiday will be a “failure” if it just acknowledges the date without spurring action on issues such as police brutality, voting rights, and the racial wealth gap, Delmont continued.