Juneteenth: Who does America still leave behind?

June 19, 2022

By: Chauncy Whaley

Juneteenth is, first and foremost, a day to celebrate. Today, we commemorate the freedom of enslaved people, which was granted through the passage of the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863.

With this news, it was decided that the Union Army was responsible for enforcing the proclamation in formerly-Confederate states. Slave owners in Texas successfully kept this news from enslaved people in the state until June 19, 1865, two years later, when the Union Army finally delivered the message.

It’s important that we recognize, still today, the institutional bias and discrimination in who receives what information and when.

In 1863, Black people were left behind by a government that failed to inform them of their rights as free Americans. Today, we’re too often left behind by institutions that fail to inform us of the information we need to be able to simply cast a ballot and make our voices heard in the democracy we deserve an equal say in.

Read more here.