[Dilbert San Diego]

The facts may be too long to put in a post on this site.

June 19th 1865 is supposed to be the date that people in Galveston Texas learned about the Emancipation Proclamation.

Slavery was not legally ended until the ratification of the 13th Amendment in December 1865.

The Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves in areas that were in Rebellion against the United States. It did not free slaves in border states which remained in the Union but still had slaves.

But in popular usage this date is said to be the date slavery ended. That is not historically accurate but this is how people are talking about it.

[lightman]

Slavery was not legally ended until the ratification of the 13th Amendment in December 1865.

Celebrate that with Christmas; remembering Who truly freed ALL the slaves.

[GingisK]

Sort of like celebrating the new millennium on Jan 1, 2000.

[hanamizu]

“But in popular usage this date is said to be the date slavery ended. That is not historically accurate but this is how people are talking about it.”

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My point was that we now have a Federal holiday based on an historical inaccuracy. Even if people take a vote and a vast majority say that slavery ended on June 19, 1865 doesn’t make it so. The fact is that until it was made a holiday by Congress/Biden, most Americans outside of Texas had never heard of ‘Juneteenth’.

The Emancipation, somewhat ironically only freed slaves who were not under Union control on January 1, 1863. This not only included the slave border states and DC but also Tennessee and parts of Virginia and Louisiana. Only as the Union army advanced though the South were the slaves freed.