It took two years of fighting between the Union and Confederacy after the Emancipation Proclamation, and another three months after the Confederacy surrendered, for Texas slaves to hear the news that they were free. Southerners – most notably here in Texas – were going about their slave-owning lives at the end of the Civil War, feigning ignorance to fend off the inconvenient reality that it was suddenly illegal to own another human being.
That refusal to free their slaves led to what we know today as Juneteenth, the day a U.S. general came to Texas in 1865 and read General Order No. 3, proclaiming freedom for slaves in Texas. Juneteenth is undoubtedly cause for celebration, but it is not a notch in America’s “history” of exceptionalism to hold up as proof of progress.
Convenient History Persists
Fast forward 160 years and America is still trying to ignore, rewrite, or gloss over the disappointing and devastating legacy of slavery in this country. Talking about race and slavery has always been inconvenient for Americans.
It’s uncomfortable, and it should be. But the uncomfortable conversation, the responsibility and the admission that change is necessary, are things many Americans aggressively oppose today, the same way many resisted freeing slaves in 1865.
Some oppose these conversations and that responsibility so much today that legislators across the country – in at least 25 states – have passed bans on the teaching of Critical Race Theory in public schools. The philosophy is not at the center of the issue, though. The laws are vague and deferential once again to white Americans, essentially making it against the law to talk about anything related to race or our past that might be construed as blame or responsibility.
The latest assault is on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs that are meant to make us all aware and continue to work toward a more equitable opportunity for all in this country.
It’s all an effort to slip out of the grasp of responsibility for a history rife with racism and systemic policies and practices that have kept whites at the top and minorities struggling for equal footing. Six decades after the height of the Civil Rights Movement, our politicians are fighting hard to sanitize our history, taking the sting out of the reality, and where it can’t be softened enough to protect white fragility, it is being rewritten or banned completely.
When we discuss Juneteenth today, we can celebrate the occasion itself. We can mark the day. We can focus on the positive that slaves were freed. That is certainly something to celebrate, but the way conservatives want you to celebrate is to treat the moment like the climax of a Disney movie where everyone then lived happily ever after. History demonstrates there is no simple, neatly packaged ending to such things.
We are not allowed to have honest discussions that recognize the parts of our history that don’t fit into the mythical mantras of American exceptionalism, divine right and manifest destiny.
To sidestep the unsavory implications and residual impacts of the full historical context surrounding occasions like Juneteenth, lawmakers in Texas have made it law that we cannot discuss the hesitations and resistance to freeing slaves in Texas. We can’t discuss this foundation of the resistance to equality for free Blacks that has persisted since the day the order was read in Galveston.
We can’t discuss the systemic barriers created that helped whites maintain every advantage in American society. We can’t discuss the anger and hate unleashed by this declaration that stoked the emergence of the Klan and other white supremacists groups that persist today. By law, we can only see that day as the end of something terrible that we no longer need to talk about.
We Can Still Share the Message
The reading of General Order No. 3 in Galveston was not a benevolent act, it was more like when you finally do the countdown with your child to get them to behave or else. It was but one of the steps grudgingly taken in American history on a continuing journey toward an elusive true equality. If we want progress, Americans can’t simply rewrite history and celebrate “saving the day” when in reality they are just being forced to right the wrongs they committed.
Regressive legislation can make it difficult, but we can discuss our real history and talk about the real and ongoing impact of it on many Americans – from Blacks and Hispanics, to women and the LGBTQ+ community. They may remove it from endorsed textbooks, try to ban it from libraries, and strip away the lessons and discussions from our schools, but we can carry that message.
We can celebrate milestones in American history and still think critically about their impact then and today. If we don’t, and we let America off the hook for its mistakes, we will continue to repeat them and continue to create barriers to true equity, opportunity and acceptance.
Celebrate the 160-year-old final call for the end of slavery in Texas, and think about what you can do today to continue to chip away at the racism that persists.