President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, but the news did not reach Galveston until June 19, 1865. Today we celebrate Juneteenth! This holiday commemorates the effective end of slavery in the United States: 157 years ago today, Union soldiers landed in Galveston, Texas to deliver the news to the last enslaved Black Americans that the Civil War had ended and that the enslaved were now free.
