Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York announced that state employees will have the day off this year for Juneteenth on June 19th, and next year he will sign legislation to have Juneteenth declared an official holiday.
Yippee! Hip, Hip Horary! About time!
But...
Don't let us see any Juneteenth day of sales. Don't let them commercialize it. Don't let this become Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's Day. Don't fall for it. Do NOT shop at any Juneteenth sales. Don't do it. Just don't.
Juneteenth began on June 19, 1865 when news of freedom reached the enslaved in Galveston, Texas, two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation. The story is that Union soldiers landed in Galveston Texas after the fall of General Lee. Lore has it that an emissary was killed on his way to deliver the message that all slaves were to be freed. Another one is that the soldiers delayed their arrival to give slave owners more time for free labor. Lore also has it that the slave owners deliberately kept the slaves in bondage to keep their workforce intact. Another lore (mine) is that Lincoln didn't care one way or the other. In his words:
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy Slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it…Abraham Lincoln, in a letter to Horace Greeley, founder and editor of the New-York Tribune
Juneteenth is a celebration of freedom. It's Independence Day for Black folks. It's not July 4th. America's Independence Day has been celebrated since 1776. During slavery! It is definitely not Independence Day for Blacks. In the words of Frederick Douglass:
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy -- a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour. Frederick Douglass in a speech on July 5, 1852.
1852 practices more shocking. 2020 practices more shocking.
Because of the Coronavirus, many celebrations were cancelled this year. However, due to the unrelenting protests and marches since the murder of George Floyd, marches and rallies for the cause will also commemorate Juneteenth.
As a part of my protest, I will not celebrate July 4th this year. Until…
Watch below and find out all you need to know about Juneteenth:
Thanks for that education Heather. I join you in not celebrating July 4th for the hollow mockery and brass fronted impudence we see continue to play out in society today. How much longer?
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