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Reporting by: Caitlyn Arnwine (formerly Caitlyn Cobb). This article was written in 2025 with a complete source list at the bottom. Sources are also cited throughout the article.
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⮚ Introduction
Today, February 7th, 2025, we are celebrating emancipation by examining Juneteenth and how it's been used to mobilize voters and celebrate freedom. This is Part 1 of the 3-part exploration of emancipation and what work still needs to be done to fulfill its promise. This mini-series is a part of the 2025 #VRABlackHistory #WeWillToo Series. Today's story highlights Laura Smalley; The Colored Conventions; G.T. Ruby from Texas and P.B.S. Pinchback and James H. Ingraham both from Louisiana; George T. Downing and John Sella Martin; R. J. Evans; Opal Lee; and, Sam Collins III and explores the first Juneteenth; how Juneteenth has been celebrated and used to mobilize voters; why that was and still is necessary work today; and, the stories behind Juneteenth becoming a federal Holiday.
Alejandra Granado, Community Organizing Fellow at the Legal Defense Fund, said in a June 2023 article, “Juneteenth is a day for us to gather and honor the ancestors that came before us. It commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. As we celebrate Juneteenth, it serves as a day for us to reflect as a community — because although Black people are no longer enslaved, we faced and continue to face oppression in this country.
"In the present day, our communities are being attacked and we will not be truly free until formerly incarcerated people have voting rights, our LGBTQ+ communities are safe from harmful legislation, and our schools are not censoring our history by removing the little pieces of representation that we have. It’s more important than ever for those of us who have voting rights to be civically engaged and to use the power that we do have to shift power and resources to those who are still not free.” (“Juneteenth’s Enduring Connection to Voting Rights,” LDF, June 16, 2023)
"Juneteenth stands as a poignant reminder of the profound interconnection between the struggle for racial equality and the fight for voting rights in the United States. This historic day, commemorating the promises of emancipation, undeniably honors the past. And it also recognizes the ongoing challenges, both past and present, faced by marginalized communities in their pursuit of full citizenship and political empowerment.
"Even after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and the subsequent ratification of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, which respectively abolished slavery, granted citizenship to formerly enslaved people, and prohibited racial discrimination in voting, Black people in America continued to face systemic barriers and voter suppression tactics as they sought to exercise their rights." (“Juneteenth’s Enduring Connection to Voting Rights,” LDF, 2023)
"The Emancipation Proclamation issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, had established that all enslaved people in Confederate states in rebellion against the Union 'shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.'
"But in reality, the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t instantly free any enslaved people. The proclamation only applied to places under Confederate control and not to slave-holding border states or rebel areas already under Union control. However, as Northern troops advanced into the Confederate South, many enslaved people fled behind Union lines." (What Is Juneteenth?, 2024)
⮚ The First Juneteenth
Transcript: Interview with Mrs. Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 [Part 4 of 5], emphasis added. (Source and to listen: https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05497b/ )
John Henry Faulk: Well, did the slaves ever try a slip away, they ever try to run off?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: No. Not none on, not, not none on the place where we was. I never heard them say they run off over there. Run off. Other places I heared them stay in the woods, and ah, so long until they wear the clothes off them, slip up. Now I heard mama say when she was a girl, when she was girl, you know, she, she, she because she brought from Mississippi, when she was a girl, they'd ah, they'd one old woman run off. She did run off. They beat her so she run off—and every night she slip home and somebody have her something to eat. Something to eat. And she'd get that vittles and go on back in the woods. Go on back stay in the woods. And they would—you know just a, they'd tell her, the other, you know, because you see, I don't know what they name, ’See so and so? Ever see them?‘ Say, ’No. ’ Well, you tell them if they come home we ain't going whup them. We ain't going whup them if they come home. Well, that be all the way know they'd come. Said once that a man stayed in the woods so long, until his hair long on them like a dog.
John Henry Faulk: [ laugh ]
Mrs. Laura Smalley: On them. You know, just growed up, you know, and stayed in the woods. Just stayed in the woods.
Unidentified Woman Interviewer: Hmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: And they couldn't get them out.
John Henry Faulk: Well, did any of them run off and get plum free, where they, did you ever hear of—
Mrs. Laura Smalley: I heard talk of them.
John Henry Faulk: —your mother talking about them?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Heard them talking about they going off, you know. Going off to places where they free. ??? what I heard her say, I didn't know that. She said just like see, be some white people, you know, with some nigga come along, you know, and he'd just get them off, you know. She take them, carry them off where he wouldn't be, tell them he wouldn't be no slave, or wouldn't be beat up, you know. And carry them off that a way.
John Henry Faulk: Uhmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Still, two or three they said that white folk had carried some three or four, you know, [ a horn blows ] colored people off that way. Or pick up children. Say they used to go in a wagons, you know. Go out wagons with the covers on them. I, I would see covers since I been big enough with wagon, with covers on them. Just take them and go on. And when I was a child I see little boys. A man jumped out the old covered wagon and caught the child. And caught him. And got far as Bell [Bellville, Texas] with the child. Well, I reckon that, that was a slave, I don't know. [Reckon that (?)] was a slave, but they caught him. Caught the child. And I had a grandchild that, that they taken off.
John Henry Faulk: Is that right? Who took him off?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Ah the show people I they took him off. I don't know. They took him off. They steal him.
John Henry Faulk: What do you know?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Yes, they took that child off and mama didn't have but that one. And they took it off.
Unidentified Woman Interviewer: Mhmm.
John Henry Faulk: Well, I declare. Took him off with them.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Took it off. But they got it. [Master thought at that time (?)].
John Henry Faulk: Well, can you remember how the, what, what happened when they set you free? Do you remember what the, can you, you remember how the old master acted when they—
Mrs. Laura Smalley: No, sir. I can't remember that, you know. Can't remember that.But I, I remember, you know, the time you give them a big dinner, you know on the nineteenth.
John Henry Faulk: Is that right?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: On, on the nineteenth, you know. That's called, they still have it, give them a big dinner—on nineteenth. Well now, we didn't know about ??? . I don't hide the other side of the folks, you know, freedom. We didn't know. They just thought, you know, were just feeding us, you know. Just had a long table. And just had ah, just a little of everything you want to eat, you know. And drink, you know. Now, and they say that was on the nineteenth—and everything you want to eat and drink. Well, you see, I didn't know what that was for.
John Henry Faulk: Uhmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: I just, you know, children wasn't wise like children is now, you know. Anything grow up now a child six, seven years old can tell you.
John Henry Faulk: That's right.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Yes, sir. They wasn't wise, they are, that's the way they done us. Give us a big dinner, Mr. Bethany and them. Mr. Bethany got Miss Mayor, and Mr. Bethany granddaughter stay right across town. And ah, she got a daughter stay out here in the country. Out near me stay.
John Henry Faulk: Hmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Out here in the country.”
“Laura Smalley’s voice crackles and comes to life. It is 1941, and she is talking in her native Hempstead, Texas, to a University of Texas professor, John Henry Faulk, about being enslaved, how she became free on June 19, 1865. That made Smalley, who then estimated she was 85, one of the last living witnesses to the original Juneteenth, although she did not know it was occurring at the time. Her interview is now preserved in the Library of Congress’ collection of recordings, and she was not alone in remembering what happened when Union soldiers made their way through Texas, two months after Confederates surrendered at Appomattox Court House in April 1865. Smalley, Uncle Billy McCrea, and Aunt Harriet Smith were recorded and interviewed in 1940 and 1941 by Faulk, at the time a professor collecting folklore and memories, and later a radio broadcaster and advocate for civil rights. Smalley, like many of the enslaved millions, did not know her real age, but thought she was 10 when freedom came, on June 19.” (Recordings Surface Revealing what Happened First Juneteenth, Times, 2021)
"Juneteenth (short for 'June Nineteenth') marks the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas in 1865 to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people be freed. The troops’ arrival came a full two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation...In Texas, slavery had continued as the state experienced no large-scale fighting or significant presence of Union troops. Many enslavers from outside the Lone Star State had moved there, as they viewed it as a safe haven for slavery. After the war came to a close in the spring of 1865, General Granger’s arrival in Galveston that June signaled freedom for Texas’s 250,000 enslaved people. Although emancipation didn’t happen overnight for everyone—in some cases, enslavers withheld the information until after harvest season—celebrations broke out among newly freed Black people, and Juneteenth was born. That December, slavery in America was formally abolished with the adoption of the 13th Amendment." (What Is Juneteenth?, 2024)
Transcript: Interview with Mrs. Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 [Part 1 of 5], emphasis added. (Source and to listen: https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05496a/
John Henry Faulk: Well, do you remember, remember any of the slaves being sold? Do you remember any slave sellers, you know, men that would just buy and sell slaves?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: No, sir. I never did see it. Why I never, us children never did know that, you know. We heard talk of it, but then I reckon that was after, after slavery I reckon. We heard talk of it. I used to hear them talk about, you know, you putting them on stumps, you know. Or something high, you know and bidding them off like you did cattle.
John Henry Faulk: Hmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Bid them off like you did cattle.
John Henry Faulk: Well, none of your folks were ever sold then?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: No, sir. None of them never was sold.
Unidentified Woman Interviewer: You were born right there and never did leave? You were?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Born right there and stayed there until I was about nine, ten years old, maybe more. Stayed right there. We didn't know where to go.
Unidentified Woman Interviewer: Uhmm.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Mama and them didn't know where to go, you see after freedom broke. Just turned, just like you turn something out, you know. Didn't know where to go. That's just where they stayed.
Unidentified Woman Interviewer: Uh huh. That's right.
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Hmm. Didn't know where to go. Turned us out just like, you know, you turn out cattle. [ laugh ] I say. Didn't know where ta go.
John Henry Faulk: You remember when the Civil War was being fought?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Well, I, I can't remember much about it, but I remember this much: When uh, Mr. Bethany, was gone a long time. Look like a long, long, time. And I remember all the next morning, it when he, he got up. Now don't get, don't knock with that back there, Well, ah, he, he ah, we all got up and all of them went to the house. Went to the house to see old master. And I thought old master was dead, but he wasn't. He had been off to the war, and ah, come back. But then I didn't know, you know, until the war. I just know he was gone a long time. All the niggas gathered around to see the old master again. You know, and old master didn't tell you know, they was free.
John Henry Faulk: He didn't tell you that?
Mrs. Laura Smalley: Uh-uh. No he didn't tell. They worked there, I think now they say they worked them, six months after that. Six months. And turn them loose on the nineteenth of June. That's why, you know, we celebrate that day. Colored folks—celebrates that day. [ repeats end of sentence ]
END OF SIDE A
“A new day full of promise and potential dawned as news of freedom finally reached enslaved Black people in the southernmost parts of the United States. Juneteenth’s significance extends far beyond this single moment in history, however. The tradition of Juneteenth weaves a tapestry of struggle, resilience, and the unyielding pursuit of freedom. Rooted in the dark legacy of slavery and the grueling fight for emancipation, Juneteenth stands as a symbol of hope — and a reminder of the long, arduous journey toward racial justice and full equality in America. The day prompts us to examine our shared history, confront uncomfortable truths, and work collectively toward a more just, inclusive future — one that includes full political empowerment.” (“Juneteenth’s Enduring Connection to Voting Rights,” LDF, 2023)
"The year following 1865, freedmen in Texas organized the first of what became the annual celebration of 'Jubilee Day' on June 19. In the ensuing decades, Juneteenth commemorations featured music, barbecues, prayer services and other activities, and as Black people migrated from Texas to other parts of the country the Juneteenth tradition spread." (What Is Juneteenth?, 2024)
⮚ Political Conventions, Voter Registration Drives, Feasts, and Festivals: How To Celebrate Juneteenth
"On June 19 ('Juneteenth'), 1865, Union general Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston and issued General Order Number 3, which read, 'The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freed are advised to remain at their present homes, and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts; and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.' The tidings of freedom reached the approximately 250,000 slaves in Texas gradually as individual plantation owners informed their slaves over the months following the end of the war. The news elicited an array of personal celebrations, some of which have been described in The Slave Narratives of Texas (1974). The first broader celebrations of Juneteenth were used as political rallies and to teach freed African Americans about their voting rights." (Juneteenth, Acosta, n.d.)
“Forty-nine Colored Conventions are known to have met in the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia from 1865 to 1879.” (“Stake Claim or Take Flight: The Birth Of Southern Conventions After The Civil War - Chapter Postbellum Southern Conventions,” Colored Conventions Project, n.d.)
“1,053: Total number of recorded delegates to postbellum conventions in the South from 1865-1879.
“236: Highest delegate attendance at a southern convention: Georgia State Colored Convention, Macon, 1869
“8: Lowest delegate attendance at a southern convention: State Convention of the Colored People of North Carolina, Raleigh, 1865
“While women are not listed among the 1,053 delegates, we have records for in this set of conventions. They were undoubtedly enacting social and political change like their male counterparts. [Black women were fundraisers, delegates and speakers (after a certain year), and spectators at the conventions. ( The “Conventions” Of Conventions: Political Rituals And Traditions, Chapter: Women’s Roles, Colored Conventions Project, n.d.)]
…
“While the majority of delegates who went to southern conventions only ever attended one convention, there are a few prominent figures who attended four and five...: G.T. Ruby from Texas and P.B.S. Pinchback and James H. Ingraham both from Louisiana…[and] George T. Downing and John Sella Martin…” (“Stake Claim or Take Flight: The Birth Of Southern Conventions After The Civil War - Chapter Attendees Of Southern Conventions,” Colored Conventions Project, n.d.)
“Throughout the Reconstruction era from 1865-1877 and well into the 20th century, Black people confronted a series of discriminatory practices such as literacy tests, poll taxes, intimidation, and violent acts aimed at suppressing their political participation. Black codes, restrictive laws created to inhibit Black people’s freedom after slavery had ended, also placed limitations on their ability to own land, earn wages, and participate in the political process. These concerted efforts sought to undermine the hard-fought gains of freedom.
"In the face of such adversity, Black communities rallied together, organizing voter registration drives, advocating for equal access to the ballot box, and demanding their constitutional rights. This community-based advocacy echoes that found in the earliest Juneteenth celebrations, during which organizers held political rallies and provided newly-freed individuals with information about their voting rights. In these shared moments was the recognition that freedom, long-deferred, would be an active fight. Juneteenth became a rallying cry — a symbol of resilience and determination — as Black people recognized that their liberation was intertwined with the right to shape their own destinies through meaningful political engagement.” (“Juneteenth’s Enduring Connection to Voting Rights,” LDF, 2023)
Over the years, Juneteenth celebrations evolved through the late 1800's through the early 1900's. "The day has been celebrated through formal thanksgiving ceremonies at which the hymn 'Lift Every Voice' furnished the opening. In addition, public entertainment, picnics, and family reunions have often featured dramatic readings, pageants, parades, barbecues, and ball games. Blues festivals have also shaped the Juneteenth remembrance. In Limestone County, celebrants gather for a three-day reunion organized by the Nineteenth of June Organization. Some of the early emancipation festivities were relegated by city authorities to a town's outskirts; in time, however, African American groups collected funds to purchase tracts of land for their celebrations, including Juneteenth. A common name for these sites was Emancipation Park. In Houston, for instance, a deed for a ten-acre site was signed in 1872, and in Austin the Travis County Emancipation Celebration Association acquired land for its Emancipation Park in the early 1900s; the Juneteenth event was later moved to Rosewood Park. In Limestone County the Nineteenth of June Association acquired thirty acres, which has since been reduced to twenty acres by the rising of Lake Mexia.
"Particular celebrations of Juneteenth have had unique beginnings or aspects. In the state capital Juneteenth was first celebrated in 1867 under the direction of the Freedmen's Bureau and became part of the calendar of public events by 1872. Juneteenth in Limestone County has gathered 'thousands' to be with families and friends. At one time 30,000 African Americans gathered at Booker T. Washington Park, known more popularly as Comanche Crossing, for the event. One of the most important parts of the Limestone celebration is the recollection of family history, both under slavery and since. Another of the state's memorable celebrations of Juneteenth occurred in Brenham, where large, racially-mixed crowds witness the annual promenade through town. In Beeville, residents of all races have also joined together to commemorate the day with barbecues, picnics, and other festivities.
"The 1960s brought changes to the celebration. During the civil rights movement, student participants in Atlanta, Georgia, 'wore Juneteenth Freedom buttons.' The 1968 Poor People’s March to Washington, D.C., ended on June 19, and partakers returned to their home cities across the nation, including Milwaukee and Minneapolis, to celebrate the event. These two cities still hold some of the largest Juneteenth events. The Black Power movement engendered 'racial pride, economic empowerment, and the creation of political and cultural institutions, and brought renewed focus on celebrating Juneteenth." (Juneteenth, Acosta, n.d.-b)
As Candice Battise, Campaign Strategist for Political Participation at the Legal Defense Fund said in a June 2023 article, “Voting is not a privilege; it is a fundamental pillar of our democracy. Equitable access to the ballot box grants marginalized communities the power to influence policies and leadership that directly shape their lives and neighborhoods. By diluting and silencing the voices of minority voters, these restrictive measures undermine the very principles of liberation, equality, and justice that Juneteenth represents.
"To truly honor Juneteenth’s legacy and advance the ongoing fight for freedom, we must steadfastly protect and expand voting rights, especially at the state level.” (“Juneteenth’s Enduring Connection to Voting Rights,” LDF, June 16, 2023)
Many organizations have used Juneteenth to still create op eds about voting and run voter initiatives, such as the Transformative Justice Coalition's Juneteenth Tours and Events centered around getting out the vote and giving away banned books.
⮚ The Fight For Juneteenth to Become An Official Holiday: From R.J. Evans in 1879 to Opal Lee in 2021
“R. J. Evans, Black politician, was born a slave in Louisiana in 1853. He entered Texas in 1857 and became a schoolteacher after emancipation and before his election as city alderman of Navasota. In 1878 he was elected to the Sixteenth Legislature as a Republican from Grimes County. He won reelection as a Greenbacker in 1880 but ran as a Republican in 1882 and lost. Evans, seeking to obtain the rights of African Americans, became a skillful legislator…In 1879 Evans proposed legislation to do away with the convict lease system, especially as it led to mistreatment of Black convicts. He also introduced a resolution to celebrate the anniversary of Black emancipation in Texas, June 19, 1865 (Juneteenth).” (Evans, R. J. (1853–1921), Douglas Hales, published January 1, 1995; updated October 21, 2020)
"In 1979, Texas became the first state to make Juneteenth an official holiday; several others followed suit over the years." (What Is Juneteenth?, 2024)
“Around Galveston, Sam Collins III is better known as Professor Juneteenth. For the past 20 years [in 2024], Collins, 53, has devoted his life to educating the public about Juneteenth…His own family’s history in Texas dates back seven generations to 1837, when his oldest documented ancestor Joseph Thompson was brought to Brazoria County as an enslaved child. Other family members hailed from San Felipe and Sealy. Like many other Black families who fled to the bigger cities of Houston and Galveston in the decades after 1865, Collins’ family sought better opportunities on the island in 1925. But every Juneteenth, they made their way back home to celebrate the holiday with extended family members…In 2006, he gathered what he found and hosted his own Juneteenth celebration at the Stringfellow estate in Hitchcock, a former plantation that Collins had purchased and repurposed as a family home and space to present Black history. Six-hundred people attended that celebration. That same year, Ronald Meyers, a Mississippi doctor who had since 1999 been championing a federal Juneteenth holiday, reached out to Collins for help. Through the National Juneteenth Observance Foundation, Meyers worked with Opal Lee, who became the foremost representative of the national campaign, and Collins.” (The Struggle to Fulfill Juneteenth’s Promise and Reckon with Its History, Lee, 2024)
“Lee became widely known in the 21st century as the ‘Grandmother of Juneteenth’ for her role in having the date—when Union soldiers arrived in Texas in 1865 to tell the enslaved people of the state of that the Emancipation Proclamation had granted them their freedom—made a national holiday in 2021…Opal Flake was born on October 7, 1926, to Mattie Broadous Flake and Otis Flake…In 1937 her father, a railroad worker, moved to Forth Worth, and the family, which now included Flake and her two younger brothers, followed later that year. On June 18, 1939, the family of five moved into a house on East Annie Street…Just hours after the family moved in, two men came to the front door and ordered the family to move, Mattie Broadous Flake told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram at the time. Later that day two men drove by in a car, shouting an ominous warning: ‘You’re here tonight, but you’ll be moved out tomorrow night.’ The family fled to the home of friends several blocks away, and in the early hours of June 19, 1939, a mob of white rioters ransacked the house, broke windows, and set their furniture on fire.
“…[t]he date became seared in her memory. ‘The fact that it happened on the 19th day of June has spurred me to make people understand that Juneteenth is not just a festival’ she told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in 2021.” (Opal Lee | Juneteenth, Fire, Historic Walk, Biography, & Facts | Britannica, 2025)
"Despite the work of [Evans], Meyers, Lee, and Collins, among others, it would be the 2020 mass protests against racist police brutality that spread following the murder of George Floyd that would push the federal government to recognize Juneteenth. 'That started a social movement, an uprising and awakening of consciousness. The National Juneteenth Observance Foundation had been trying to get recognition for 26 years, but no one was paying attention, until after what happened to George Floyd,' Collins said. After more than 150 years, President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth bill in June 2021." (The Struggle to Fulfill Juneteenth’s Promise and Reckon with Its History, Lee, 2024)
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