Marching bands sparked loud cheers and quieter reflections about racial justice from crowds gathered to mark Juneteenth as a new U.S. federal holiday commemorates the end of the legal enslavement of Black Americans
making Juneteenth the 11th federally recognized holiday, just over a year after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis ignited nationwide protests for racial justice and for ending police brutality.Juneteenth, or June 19th, marks the day in 1865 when a Union general informed a group of enslaved people in Texas that they had been made free two years earlier by President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War.
"There are mixed feelings for me," said Jermaine Washington, a marching band director who lives in Stone Mountain, Georgia, just 20 miles northeast of Atlanta. Around the United States, concerts, rallies, art displays and lots of food were among events planned for Juneteenth.Atlanta and its metro area have been celebrating Juneteenth for years. Richard Rose, president of the Atlanta chapter of the NAACP, said this year's designation of Juneteenth as a federal holiday resonates in the city often called the "cradle of the civil rights movement.
Munson said that while strides have been made, recent incidents of police brutality toward Black people and legislation in several U.S. states that curtails voting rights show that much work still needs to be done. One of the events taking place in Colorado is a flyover to honor the legacy of aviation pioneer Bessie Coleman, who in 1921 became the first African-American woman to earn a pilot's license.
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