Juneteenth (short for June 19th), which became a federal holiday in 2021, marks the end of the nightmare of slavery and the dawn of a new beginning for African Americans.  

The holiday falls on June 19 because on that date in 1865, U.S. troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, to ensure that some of the last enslaved people were freed following the Civil War. Many in the Black community have celebrated Juneteenth for generations.

Americans of every race should celebrate Juneteenth as an affirmation of our nation’s foundational value – what the Pledge of Allegiance calls “liberty and justice for all.”

Juneteenth calls on our nation to live up to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, which eloquently proclaims: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Even if you accept the interpretation by some that the word “men” in the declaration refers to both sexes, it is indisputable that African Americans were excluded from the declaration’s promise in a racist society that treated them as subhuman – forced to live in squalid conditions and work without pay, denied any education and bought and sold like livestock.

My own ancestors were among the enslaved. Denying the ugly truth about their brutal mistreatment and........

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