Making the day a federal holiday will make it everyone's holiday.
 | By Ezekiel Kweku Politics Editor, Opinion |
President Biden and Congress moved quickly this week to make June 19 a federal holiday, an action that corrects the absence of a national holiday to commemorate the end of slavery. It nationalizes Juneteenth, a celebration of the news of the Emancipation Proclamation reaching Texas, two and a half years after it was declared. At its heart, Juneteenth is a holiday for Black Texans, which spread to other parts of the country with the Great Migration. |
Making Juneteenth a federal holiday effectively makes it everyone's holiday. For Kevin Young, the director of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, it is right for all of us, regardless of race, to remember. |
"African Americans should not have to bear the burden of this history alone," Young writes. "Nor should Black achievement be something that only African Americans celebrate." |
But he also argues that the holiday can be good only if it can retain its essential character as a Black holiday: one that is "both serious and playful," one in which we "cook and laugh while we remember, remaining rooted in tradition while telling the full story of America and Black life in it."
Kaitlyn Greenidge, an Opinion contributing writer, is more ambivalent about Juneteenth becoming a national holiday. As she points out in her essay today, different parts of the country have their own specific histories of emancipation and their own traditions associated with them. Those histories shouldn't be forgotten, Greenidge argues, because they "are a reminder that freedom in this country has never meant the same thing to everyone, has definitely never been experienced the same, and has always been conditional." |
Nor should the myriad traditions of emancipation, the source of a "sense of self and solidarity," be traded for a co-opted and corporatized version of it.
Both Young and Greenidge bring context and nuance to what some are treating as an unambiguous good, a symbol of progress. I hope you get a chance to sit with these essays this weekend, either before or after your cookout. |
Here's what we're focusing on today: |
Forward this newsletter to friends to share ideas and perspectives that will help inform their lives. They can sign up here. Do you have feedback? Email us at opiniontoday@nytimes.com |
Contact Us
If you have questions about your Times account, delivery problems or other issues, visit our Help Page or contact The Times. |
|
No comments:
Post a Comment