Juneteenth Matters

Say Her Name

Today is Juneteenth, the day the news of freedom finally reached the last enslaved people in Texas. It is both a celebration and a reckoning, a joyful sigh and a historical side-eye.

On June 19, 2016, President Obama marked Juneteenth with a statement that reads both like a benediction and a challenge. He spoke of freedom delayed—not denied, but deferred—and reminded us that emancipation isn’t a finish line, but a promise that must be kept over and over again.

Statement by the President on the Observance of Juneteenth

Just outside the Oval Office hangs a painting depicting the night of December 31, 1862. In it, African-American men, women, and children crowd around a single pocket watch, waiting for the clock to strike midnight and the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect. As the slaves huddle anxiously in the dimly lit room, we can sense how even two more minutes seems like an eternity to wait for one’s freedom. But the slaves of Galveston, Texas, had to wait more than two years after Lincoln’s decree and two months after Appomattox to receive word that they were free at last.

Today we commemorate the anniversary of that delayed but welcome news. Decades of collective action would follow as equality and justice for African-Americans advanced slowly, frustratingly, gradually, on our nation’s journey toward a more perfect union. On this Juneteenth, we remember that struggle as we reflect on how far we’ve come as a country. The slaves of Galveston knew their freedom was only a first step, just as the bloodied foot soldiers who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge 100 years later knew they had to keep marching.

Juneteenth is a time to recommit ourselves to the work that remains undone. We remember that even in the darkest hours, there is cause to hope for tomorrow’s light. Today, no matter our race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation, we recommit ourselves to working to free modern-day slaves around the world and to honoring in our own time the efforts of those who fought so hard to steer our country truer to our highest ideals.

While his words soared, Obama did not make Juneteenth a federal holiday. This is partly because the Republicans, who were thoroughly disinterested in a Juneteenth holiday, purportedly for fiscal reasons, controlled both houses during Obama’s final years. But it is also because a) 3-in-4 Americans had never celebrated Juneteenth and/or were unfamiliar with it, b) it was a divisive issue, and c) Obama was an African-American president desperately trying to be a unifying voice for all Americans.

Four years later—in the waning days of the first Trump term and weeks after the killing of George Floyd—public opinion on Juneteenth showed signs of a shift.

Dr. Theodore Johnson tells The Real Story of the Politics of Juneteenth in a post for the Brennan Center for Justice, reminding us that:

Nearly half of all respondents—and almost a third of black folks—heard of Juneteenth for the first time in 2020, largely a result of then-president Trump announcing a controversial campaign decision to mark the date by visiting Tulsa, Oklahoma. Indeed, after selecting the site of one of the worst episodes of racial violence in the nation’s history for his celebratory rally—just weeks after George Floyd’s murder—Trump embraced the scandal, saying, “I did something good: I made Juneteenth very famous . . . Nobody had ever heard of it.”

I hope you will forgive me for refusing to give credit to Mr. Trump for making Juneteenth a federal holiday.

If credit belongs to anyone, it’s Opal Lee. If you’ve never heard of Opal Lee, I’m glad you’re here. Read on.

They call Opal Lee the Grandmother of Juneteenth, and rightly so. Lee has carried the torch of freedom with unshakable grace, turning memory into movement and heartbreak into history. It was she who led the long, patient campaign to see June 19th recognized not just as a local celebration, but as a national reckoning.

Opal Lee, now 98, receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Her reasons were carved not only from the pages of history but from her own childhood scars. On June 19 (yes, June 19) 1939 when she was just 12 years old, a white mob descended upon her family’s new home in Fort Worth, Texas. They burned it to the ground for the simple sin of a Black family daring to live in a white neighborhood. Her family never spoke of that night again—but Opal never forgot. Instead, she turned silence into action.

Lee became a teacher, a counselor, and a community organizer. She planted hope in the form of food banks and farms, ensuring her neighbors could eat even when systems failed them. And every June, she helped organize celebrations of Juneteenth in Texas—keeping the flame alive, year after year.

Then in 2020, at age 89, when most would be content to rest, Lee decided to walk from Galveston to D.C. 1400 miles. An epic journey to remind America of its unfinished business. Her campaign began as a whisper. Then came 2020. The murder of George Floyd cracked the nation’s conscience open, and what began as a modest petition swelled into a movement. When Lee arrived in the capital, she did so with 1.5 million signatures to bring to Mr. Biden and a nation newly awakened to her call.

Opal Lee didn’t just make history—she lived it, walked it, and re-wrote it. She tells her story on this BBC podcast that aired on Monday (my notes above are drawn from this podcast).

If you like podcasts, I cordially invite you to check out this podcast where I’m joined by one of my students who makes the case for why Juneteenth should be a national holiday. For the record, we recorded this three days before Biden created the federal holiday. So, if you don’t mind, always inspired by Trump, we’ll take the credit.

After our discussion of Juneteenth, we share proposals from students for federal holidays that don’t exist, but should. My favorites?

• March 4 - American Disagreement Day. Why March 4th? Because we need to march forth together? Nope. March 4th because on that day, John Adams peacefully and respectfully transferred the immense power of the presidency to his rival, Thomas Jefferson.

• May 17 - Desegregation Day to celebrate the 1954 Brown v. Board decision and the critical importance of rule of law.

• May 28 - Trail of Tears Day to commemorate the forced removal of the Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek) Nation, Seminole, Chickasaw, Choctaw and other Native American nations officially that began on that day per the Indian Removal Act of 1830.

• June 28 - Stonewall Uprising Day to condemn police brutality and to celebrate intersectionality, unity, and grassroots activism. A day to cherish how far we have come and carefully consider how far we have to go.

Today, you should certainly celebrate Juneteenth. If you’re wondering how to properly celebrate, might I humbly suggest you Say Her Name. Opal Lee.

Tell her story. Tell your kids. No kids? Good move. Now, tell the neighbor kids. Hate kids? Gotcha. Crack a cold one and tell her story to the bloated bellies at the bar. Not drinking? Go to the coffee shop. Say her name. Tell her story.

At the very least, please sit quiet with the notion that America is not a place, it’s a process. Obama liked to invoke Dr. King’s argument that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

While I tend to embrace it, some folks thoroughly repudiate the King/Obama view. In her essay The Fun’s in the Fight, Molly Ivins argues:

Those who think of freedom in this country as one long, broad path leading ever onward and upward are dead damned wrong. Many a time freedom has been rolled back—and always for the same sorry reason: fear.

…So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.

Happy Juneteenth!

Love,

DL