Juneteenth: Celebrating the path to freedom

Danny Federico reporter3.riverbendnews@gmail.com   “My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together.” – Desmond Tutu, Human Rights Activist Known as one of America's oldest holidays, Juneteenth (June 19) annually celebrates the end of slavery in the United States. According to Juneteenth.com, the celebration originates from Galveston, Texas, when Union solders, led by Major General Gordon Granger, arrived on June 19, 1865, with “news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free.” Although President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation two years prior on Jan. 1, 1863, it had little impact on Texans because of the “minima