Funny thing is that "Juneteenth" only involved a single State - Texas - and ignores the fact that:
1. The Emancipation Proclamation occurred on January 1, 1863.
2. The effective end of the Civil War (Lee surrenders to Grant) was on April 9, 1865.
3. The formal end of the Civil War took place in early November 1865.
4. The 13th Amendment was already approved by Congress and had been ratified by 22 of the needed 27 States at that point, and no State ratified it during the entire month of June, never mind on June 19th.
Texas was merely the last State reached by Union troops, so the "Juneteenth" was merely a public announcement of an already existing legal reality everywhere in the country. The slaves had been freed for several weeks at a bare minimum by that point. (Texas was the 33rd State to ratify the 13th Amendment, on February 18, 1870.)
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Funny thing is that "Juneteenth" only involved a single State - Texas - and ignores the fact that:
1. The Emancipation Proclamation occurred on January 1, 1863.
2. The effective end of the Civil War (Lee surrenders to Grant) was on April 9, 1865.
3. The formal end of the Civil War took place in early November 1865.
4. The 13th Amendment was already approved by Congress and had been ratified by 22 of the needed 27 States at that point, and no State ratified it during the entire month of June, never mind on June 19th.
Texas was merely the last State reached by Union troops, so the "Juneteenth" was merely a public announcement of an already existing legal reality everywhere in the country. The slaves had been freed for several weeks at a bare minimum by that point. (Texas was the 33rd State to ratify the 13th Amendment, on February 18, 1870.)
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