JUNETEENTH READ OF THE DAY
President Joe Biden signed a bill Thursday making June 19—Juneteenth—a federal holiday.
Most federal employees will have it as a paid day off; workers at some private employers, such as Allstate, Citigroup, JC Penney, Nike, Target and Twitter, already do. Others likely will follow the federal government's lead.
A tweet by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management noted that since Juneteenth falls on a Saturday this year, federal employees will observe it today.
Juneteenth commemorates the Union troops' arrival in Galveston, Texas, in 1865, where they began enforcing the Emancipation Proclamation that President Abraham Lincoln issued on Jan. 1, 1862. Texas was the last Confederate state forced to free enslaved people of color.
The Emancipation Proclamation was limited in many ways, according to the National Archives. Most importantly, the freedom it promised depended upon Union military victory for enforcement.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted 415-14 on June 16 to create the 12th federal holiday—the first since Martin Luther King Jr. Day was established in 1983. The Senate unanimously passed a similar bill on June 15. Biden called the establishment of Juneteenth as a national holiday a very important moment in U.S. history.
"Great nations don't ignore their most painful moments. … They embrace them," he said. "Great nations don't walk away. We come to terms with the mistakes we make. And in remembering those moments, we begin to heal and grow stronger."''
PO1 William "Chip" Nagel Lt Col Charlie Brown SSG Michael Noll Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen Cpl Vic Burk SGT Charlie Lee
PO2 Marco Monsalve SGT David A. 'Cowboy' Groth ]
SSG William Jones Sgt (Join to see) SrA John Monette SFC Bernard Walko
SPC Michael Terrell SMSgt Anil Heendeniya CPL Douglas Chrysler A1C Medrick "Rick" DeVaney GySgt Jack Wallace CDR Andrew McMenamin, PhD SGT Mark Anderson SGT Steve McFarland