President Joe Biden signs the legislation making the Juneteenth Holiday the law of the land
Some politicians want to hide history, some educators want to whitewash history and punish those that expose true history, and some American Blacks worry that acknowledging and exposing the full truthful history of yesterday will delay the racial progress needed today. Thankfully for American democracy, a Juneteenth national holiday will prove to be a catalyst for racial progress in America. And a cure for the potential ills that American democracy could be infected with by some politicians or some educators.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell wrote a letter, signed by him and over 3 dozen other Republican Senators, to U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona protesting a new rule to promote education programs throughout America that address systemic racism and the legacy of American slavery. McConnell and the Senators took particular exception in the letter with the 1619 Project saying, it “has become infamous for putting ill-informed advocacy ahead of historical accuracy. Our nation’s youth do not need activist indoctrination that fixates solely on past flaws and splits our nation into divided camps. Taxpayer-supported programs should emphasize the shared civic virtues that bring us together, not push radical agendas that tear us apart.”
22 state legislatures are considering legislation and 5 states Idaho, Iowa, Oklahoma, Texas, and Tennessee have voted legislation into law banning teaching the concepts of what these state politicians may or may not be correctly referring to as critical race theory. According to Jonathan Chism, assistant professor of history at the University of Houston–Downtown and co-editor of Critical Race Studies Across Disciplines, “Any anti-racist effort is being labeled as critical race theory, many that are condemning critical race theory haven’t read it or studied it intensely. This is largely predicated on fear: the fear of losing power and influence and privilege. The larger issue that this is all stemming from is a desire to deny the truth about America, about racism.”
Fox News and Republicans celebrate states that ban teaching true history
In North Carolina, the Board of Trustees of the University of North Carolina (U.N.C.) has decided to punish an educator for bringing the full truthful version of American history to light. Nikole Hannah-Jones, a winner of a Pulitzer Prize for authoring the 1619 Project, was denied a tenured position at the University of North Carolina after the university’s board of trustees abandoned the normal practice of rubber-stamping the journalism department’s recommendation to grant tenure. The normal practice is when U.N.C.’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media appoints a person to the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism, they are granted tenure upon their appointment Nikole Hannah-Jones was not!!! Over 400 faculty members signed an online statement calling for the decision to be reversed, saying the failure to grant tenure to Hannah-Jones “unfairly moves the goalposts and violates longstanding norms and established processes. This failure is especially disheartening because it occurred despite the support for Hannah-Jones’s appointment as a full professor with tenure by the Hussman dean, Hussman faculty, and university.
Hannah-Jones’s distinguished record of more than 20 years in journalism surpasses expectations for a tenured position as the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism.” Alberto Ibargüen, the president of the Knight Foundation which funds the Knight Chair, said: “It is not our place to tell U.N.C. or U.N.C./Hussman who they should appoint or give tenure to. It is, however, clear to us that Hannah-Jones is eminently qualified for the appointment and we would urge the trustees of the University of North Carolina to reconsider their decision within the time frame of our agreement.” 1,619 U.N.C. alumni and students took out a two-page ad in The News & Observer of Raleigh, N.C., calling for Hannah-Jones to be given tenure, and writer Ta-Nehisi Coates spearheaded a letter published in The Root signed by more than 200 academics and other cultural figures demanding tenure for Hannah-Jones.
Last Thursday President Joe Biden signed a bill making Juneteenth a national holiday acknowledging an end to the dark period of slavery in America. For some American Blacks, the joy of a Juneteenth holiday is rightfully overshadowed by the fierce urgency of now to preserve American Black’s right to vote, and to address the systemic racism still afflicting American Blacks. Kimberly Holmes-Ross a community organizer from Evanston, Illinois, the first U.S. city to pay reparations said she was happy about the Juneteenth holiday but she would have preferred Congress to act on anti-lynching legislation or voter protections first. “I am not super stoked only because all of the other things that are still going on,” said Holmes-Ross, 57. “You haven’t addressed what we really need to talk about.”
Republicans would prefer America’s school children be taught American fairy tales instead of the true history of slavery in the United States
Dr. Norma Gray, NAACP Rock Hill, South Carolina president says the Juneteenth holiday is a distraction from what is really needed, and she hopes that people do not forget the real change that needs to happen to help. “A little bit excited about Juneteenth becoming a federal holiday, the fact that legislation caught up with it was great news to hear but not anything that made me want to do cartwheels and backflips. It’s pretty much like giving us gravy with no meat. I need something with some teeth, in most African American communities, we recognized this. We’ve been celebrating this for as long as I can remember. But what we really need is legislation that is going to improve the condition and change systemic racism. Juneteenth is about freedom. We will not be free until all of us have equality on a federal level.”
Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Urban League of Kansas City said although she was delighted by the quick vote this week by both chambers of Congress to make Juneteenth a federal holiday, “It’s great, but it’s not enough, we need Congress to protect voting rights, and that needs to happen right now so we don’t regress any further. That is the most important thing Congress can be addressing at this time.”
The lack of enthusiasm and doubt raised by some American Blacks is not only understandable, but considering recent anti-democracy initiatives by Republicans at both the federal and state levels it’s justifiable. Given the choice between a Juneteenth holiday celebrating the end of slavery in America or a law that guarantees American Blacks the right to register to vote, the right to vote, and the right to have their vote counted makes the choice of voting rights over a Juneteenth holiday obvious. However, voting rights being the obvious choice over the Juneteenth holiday does not diminish the importance of the Juneteenth holiday to the future of American democracy.
Whether they are aware of it or not, Senate Republicans voted unanimously and all but 14 House Republicans voted to preemptively spiritually kill their current attempts to hide or whitewash the truthful history of slavery in America!!! They did so when they voted to make Juneteenth a national holiday. Making Juneteenth and the celebration of the end of slavery a national holiday makes the subject of slavery Americana by automatic default. This means the question of what does the Juneteenth Holiday celebrate might appear on an immigrant test for American citizenship like the question of who is Martin Luther King Jr periodically appears on the American citizenship test.
Most important to Republicans or to be more accurate, most deadly to Republican revisionist history attempts, are the real implications of what it means to the Republican goal of preventing the teaching of 1619 subject matter in schools, that goal is now officially a member of the walking-dead club. Because just as the subject of the Juneteenth Holiday will appear on the USA citizenship test it will also appear on academic tests of all kinds from the SAT down to high school or elementary classroom test and basic entrance exams for schools. No future creditable school curriculums can exclude the subject matter of a national holiday that uplifts a point of national history. And there is no way to accurately celebrate or educate about the end of slavery WITHOUT educating about its 1619 beginning.
All the school districts across the United States that have decided to bar teaching 1619 subject matter should prepare to reverse themselves. Juneteenth becoming a national holiday mandate teaching both the beginning and end history of slavery. The Juneteenth Holiday will also, one way or another, impact all businesses across the United States forcing them to become more informed on the subject of American slavery. A Juneteenth Holiday now means the legitimate systemic programming of American slave history and its impact on both American society and American Blacks into the psyche of American culture. This Juneteenth game-changing fact should calm the fear and doubt of American Blacks about future racial progress in America.
The Juneteenth Holiday forces exposure to the racism that created American slavery. The forced yearly exposure will further enlighten Americans to the historic wrongs of racism. Consistent exposure to how historic racism systemically impacts present-day life for American Blacks will force the historic greatness of American democracy, and the historic greatness of the American people to the surface.
This is the sentiment of most American Blacks about the new Juneteenth Holiday
The same historic American greatness that fought the Civil War over slavery, the same historic American greatness that caused 9 American White males to unanimously rule in Brown v Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, the same historic greatness that caused 73 of 100 American White Senators, 285 of 430 American White Congresspersons and only 5 American Black Congressmen to vote the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act into law, and the same American greatness that just rose to the surface last week when 100 Senators voted unanimously, and all but 14 of the 435 House members, voted to make Juneteenth a national holiday based on just the limited history most Americans know about American slavery. The only question now is how long the power of healing and cleansing American slavery from the soul of America by the Juneteenth Holiday, will take to activate the American greatness that always seeks to correct a wrong, which always fights injustice with justice, or in this case, will commit to eliminating systemic racism.