OPINION: Juneteenth is an American, not a Black, cultural event

In order to appreciate the opportunities before us, we must better understand the struggles and achievements that lie behind us. Certainly, we can agree that the current climate in America begs for a genuine dialogue about race to better bridge the gap between the past, present and future.

We must be intentional in our aim to build upon a nation with such a rich heritage. This history shapes and makes America the greatest country on the planet.

Our nation didn’t earn this from being one without faults, or shortcomings, but rather because we have the opportunity to get it right, to celebrate the good and even embrace the bad — accepting the bad with the understanding that we can’t change the past, but we have an obligation to our posterity to lay the foundation for unity, peace, hope and love.

So given this opportunity to acknowledge and to celebrate a pivotal part of American history, it is with honor and with intense joy that I say “Happy Juneteenth!”

Juneteenth is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States. It is also known as Emancipation Day, Day of Jubilee, Freedom Day, Black Independence Day and our Country’s Second Independence.

It's a 156-year-old holiday, yet until recently, most Americans had never heard of Juneteenth. One must ask why?

Nevertheless, let's explore the events that have led to this momentous celebration in America today.

Again, Juneteenth is a holiday celebrating the freedom of slaves in the United States. The name "Juneteenth" derives from the month of June and the 19th day; it is celebrated each year on June 19.

Slavery is viewed by many historians as our country’s original sin. According to Hasan Kwame Jeffries, associate professor of history at Ohio State University, “Slavery was our country’s Achilles’ heel, responsible for its near undoing. When the Southern states seceded, they did so expressly to preserve slavery.”

On Sep. 22, 1862, the Emancipation Proclamation was issued by President Abraham Lincoln. It would go into effect on Jan. 1, 1863. On New Year's Eve 1862, the first “Watch Night” services took place. On that night, all enslaved and free African Americans gathered in churches and in their homes across the country awaiting news of the Emancipation Proclamation.

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The proclamation declared “that all persons held as slaves within the rebellious states are, and henceforward shall be free.” At midnight, prayers were answered as all enslaved people in Confederate states were legally declared free. Union soldiers, many of whom were black, marched onto plantations and across cities in the South reading small copies of the Emancipation Proclamation, thus spreading the news of freedom throughout the Confederate states.

The most intriguing thing about “all” of the slaves celebrating the Emancipation Proclamation is that this proclamation only freed slaves in Confederate states that left the Union during the Civil War. Border states, the states that stayed in the union — Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland and Delaware, were not impacted.

Though the Emancipation Proclamation became effective on Jan. 1, 1863, it could not be implemented in places that were still under Confederate control. As a result, in the westernmost Confederate state of Texas, enslaved people would not be free until much later.

On June 19, 1865, freedom finally came 2½ years after the Emancipation Proclamation when Gen. Gordon Granger and his troops traveled to Galveston, Texas, to announce General Order No. 3. The result of this order? More than 250,000 enslaved people were freed.

Consequently, the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified by Congress six months later on Dec. 6, 1865. It officially abolished slavery in the United States.

The culmination of the above events led to the first Juneteenth celebration the very next year in Texas, on June 19, 1866. The original observances included food, singing of spirituals such as “Many Thousands Gone” and “Go Down Moses,” prayers, dances, parades; some events featured fireworks which involved filling trees with gunpowder and setting them on fire.

It is also noted that early celebrations involved helping newly freed Blacks learn about their voting rights.

Juneteenth has been mostly celebrated in Texas and has been a state holiday for Texans since 1980. Since then, other states followed in the acknowledgments and celebrations. Today, people celebrate Juneteenth in different ways: prayer vigils, parades, marches, street fairs, fireworks, presentations about black heritage, barbecues, public service awards, Miss Juneteenth pageants and even raising the Juneteenth Flag.

This flag is half red and half blue with a star in the middle. As part of the celebration, red food and strawberry soda were popular in that they symbolized the blood of the enslaved and the resilience in bondage.

Currently, almost all states recognize Juneteenth in some capacity; nonetheless, only a few states have made it an official holiday. On June 17, 2021, Congress passed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act, and President Joe Biden signed it into law making it a federal holiday.

Gov. Kay Ivey has authorized Juneteenth as a holiday for state workers this year in Alabama. Furthermore, it is especially meaningful to me as a former educator that Gadsden City Council voted unanimously to approve Juneteenth as an official holiday in the city. It speaks volumes to their continuous commitment to educate, to encourage diversity, to be inclusive and yes, to acknowledge and celebrate American history.

In closing, I would like to reflect personally on what Juneteenth means to me. Let me digress back to the day leading up to freedom for those enslaved. I think about the “Watch Night” services and how much praise, worship and prayer they most undoubtedly were engaged in.

As midnight approached, I would like to think the praise and worship became ecstatic even amongst those slaves in the borders states that were exempt from this proclamation of freedom. I want to believe their prayers helped open the door to freedom.

I’m always amazed at stories of those enslaved and their perseverance, their unwavering spirit of hope. With the history of slavery, its ending and, now, Juneteenth celebrations around the world, it's a reminder of the resilience and faith many slaves had.

Slaves were hopeful people, not hopeless people, and despite their temporary bondage, God was still in control!

Again, I can only imagine what Juneteenth meant to the newly freed slaves on Jan. 1, 1863, those in Texas who were released 2½ years later and those in the border states six months after that. I can say in my years of studying and teaching on slavery from its origin to emancipation, one thing is evident: Most slaves had a prayer life.

Juneteenth is not a Black cultural event; it is an American cultural event. As we celebrate Juneteenththis year, come in a spirit of expectation, a spirit of love, a spirit of unity, a spirit of hope that our future as Americans will be brighter than our past.

“Won’t it be wonderful when Black history and Native American history and Jewish history and all of U.S. history is taught in one book. Just U.S. history,” wrote Maya Angelou.

I firmly believe that I have an obligation — we have an obligation — to strengthen one another, to encourage one another, to teach the past with a hint of optimism that from the darkest depths in our nation's history there is light. We are to be the light of the world.

The late, great Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, “Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.”

Ernestina Cady Hardrick taught African American Studies and American Government at Gadsden City High School. She retired this year. The opinions reflected are her own.

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Reflecting on Juneteenth's origins, meanings