The End of Slavery and Juneteenth

After the war came to a close in the spring of 1865, General Granger’s arrival in Galveston that June signaled freedom for Texas’s 250,000 enslaved people. Celebrations broke out among newly freed Black people, but emancipation didn’t happen overnight for everyone. In some cases, enslavers withheld the information until after harvest season. That December, slavery in America was formally abolished with the adoption of the 13th Amendment.

In 1866, freedmen in Texas organized the first of what became the annual celebration of “Jubilee Day” on June 19. In the ensuing decades, Juneteenth commemorations featured music, barbecues, prayer services and other activities. As Black people migrated from Texas to other parts of the country, the Juneteenth tradition spread.

In 1979, Texas became the first state to make Juneteenth an official holiday. Several others followed suit over the years. Decades later, in June 2021, Congress passed a resolution establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday; President Joe Biden signed it into law on June 17, 2021.