Juneteenth celebrations emphasize ending racial disparities

DALLAS (AP) — After Opal Lee led hundreds in a walk through her Texas hometown to celebrate Juneteenth, the 95-year-old Black woman who helped successfully push for the holiday to get national recognition said it's important that people learn the history behind it.

“We need to know so people can heal from it and never let it happen again,” said Lee, whose 2 1/2-mile walk through Fort Worth symbolizes the 2 1/2 years it took for enforcement in Texas of President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which ended slavery in the Southern states.

A year after President Joe Biden signed legislation last year making June 19 the nation's 12th federal holiday, Americans across the country gathered this weekend at events filled with music, food and fireworks. Celebrations also included an emphasis on learning about the past and addressing racial disparities. Many people celebrated the day just as they did before any formal recognition.

Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day, commemorates the day in 1865 when Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, to order freedom for the enslaved people of the state — two months after the Confederacy had surrendered in the Civil War.

A Gallup Poll found that Americans are more familiar with the day than they were last year, with 59% saying they knew “a lot” or “some” about the holiday compared with 37% a year ago in May. The poll also found that support for making Juneteenth part of the history taught in schools increased from 49% to 63%.

Yet many states have been slow to designate it as an official holiday. Lawmakers in Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee and elsewhere failed to advance proposals this year that would have closed state offices and given most of their public employees paid time off.

Celebrations in Texas included one at a Houston...