Expect President Joe Biden to sign this bill by Saturday, June 19, the new federal holiday for Juneteenth, marking the official end of slavery in the United States.
The Hill reported:
The Senate passed the bill on Tuesday under a unanimous consent agreement hours after Putin’s Puppet in the Senate and QAnon anti-vaxxer conspiracy monger Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) announced that he would not object to its passage.
“Although I strongly support celebrating Emancipation, I objected to the cost and lack of debate. While it still seems strange that having taxpayers provide federal employees paid time off is now required to celebrate the end of slavery, it is clear that there is no appetite in Congress to further discuss the matter. Therefore, I do not intend to object,” Johnson said in a statement.
“We’ll give you your holiday marking the end of slavery, but we will do everything in our power to prevent anyone from teaching about America’s original sin and why Juneteenth is relevant.” GOP Lawmakers Intensify Effort to Ban Critical Race Theory in Schools.
In the slave state that was the last to free the slaves, which Juneteenth celebrates, Texas Governor Signs Law Banning Teachers From Talking About Racism.
The House quickly took up the bill after Senate passage.
The Hill reports, House approves Juneteenth holiday, sends bill to Biden’s desk:
Juneteenth, the oldest known celebration of the end of slavery in America, is finally on the precipice of becoming a federal holiday, as the House on Wednesday passed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act by a vote of 415-14.
All 14 “no” votes came from Sedition Caucus Republicans. Two members did not vote.
As you likley expected, Arizona’s rank embarrassments Reps. Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar voted against the Juneteenth holiday.
“What I see here today is racial divide crumbling, being crushed this day under a momentous vote that brings together people who understand the value of freedom,” Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), the principal sponsor of the bill, said at a press conference with other lawmakers shortly before the vote.
Multiple Republicans expressed concern during House floor debate that officially calling the holiday Juneteenth National Independence Day could lead to confusion with Independence Day on July 4.
The Hill continues:
“I fully support creating a day to celebrate the abolition of slavery,” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) said during House floor debate. “However, naming this day National Independence Day will create confusion and push Americans to pick one of those two days as their Independence Day based on their racial identity.”
Only if you are a friggin’ idiot, like Thomas Massie.
Massie suggested that the Juneteenth holiday could be named “Emancipation Day” instead.
This ignorant fool failed American history in school. Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation on September 22nd, 1862. It stipulated that if the Southern states did not cease their rebellion by January 1st, 1863, then the Proclamation would go into effect. The Emancipation Proclamation only applied to the Southern states in rebellion, in an effort to cripple the Confederacy. Up until September 1862, the main focus of the war had been to preserve the Union. With the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation freedom for slaves now became a legitimate war aim. The Proclamation did not actually end slavery. That required the 13th Amendment.
Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-Mich.), a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, responded moments later that Massie’s argument was “inappropriate.”
“I want my colleague on the other side — and I want to say, my white colleague on the other side — getting your independence from being enslaved in a country is different from a country getting independence to rule themselves. It is not a day that you can loop together. That is inappropriate,” Lawrence said.
One Republican, Rep. Matt Rosendale (Mont.), said ahead of the vote that making Juneteenth a federal holiday was “an effort by the left to create a day out of whole cloth to celebrate identity politics as part of its larger efforts to make Critical Race Theory the reigning ideology of our country,” referring to discussions of systemic racism in schools.
This fool apparently wants a gig at Fox News after he loses his seat next year.
Juneteenth is a portmanteau of the date that it falls on, June 19. On that day in 1865, Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger of the Union Army issued General Order No. 3 from Galveston, Texas, informing the remaining enslaved people there that they were free.
The House vote operated under a closed rule that was ironed out by the House Rules Committee early Wednesday afternoon in an effort to stop any last-minute bad-faith efforts to stop the legislation from passing.
Juneteenth is getting its day in the sun, as racial justice and equity have dominated national discussion a year after the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis sparked a national reckoning with systemic racism and police brutality.
The conversation on how to address prevailing racism and disparities in the country is littered with numerous partisan battle lines, but establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday has received relatively broad bipartisan .
Between both the House and Senate, 20 Republicans co-sponsored the legislation, with conservative Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) being one of the main proponents.
“There’s nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come,” Cornyn said at the press conference with Jackson Lee.
“It seems to me that this is the most propitious time for us to recognize our history, and to learn from it, and that’s the way I regard Juneteenth,” he added.
When the Emancipation Proclamation was put forth by former President Lincoln on Jan. 1, 1863, the Civil War was still in full swing, meaning that the declaration had no agency in states and areas that the Union Army did not control.
And even though the war officially ended on April 9, 1865, it would take Union troops another two months to make their way through Texas, which at the time was the most remote and westward state.
Granger and his troops arrived in the Port of Galveston on June 18, 1865, and a day later, he read the order emancipating all people in the state who were still enslaved.
While just now being recognized as a holiday on a federal level, Juneteenth is celebrated by many cities across the country as well as almost every state.
South Dakota is the only state that hasn’t officially recognized Juneteenth as a holiday.
The bill now heads to President Biden for his signature ahead of June 19. Expect President Biden to sign the bill by this Saturday.
UPDATE: The Washington Post reports, Biden, back from his first overseas trip, to sign bill making Juneteenth a national holiday:
President Biden, having returned to the White House from his first trip abroad as president, plans Thursday to sign into law legislation creating a federal holiday to commemorate Juneteenth, the day marking the end of slavery in Texas.
UPDATE: The Office of Personnel Management confirmed that federal workers will get Friday off to observe Juneteenth (which is on Saturday) after President Joe Biden signed the new law today.
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Sedition Caucus member Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) explained his vote against making Juneteenth a national holiday on Fox Radio.
Norman explained: “How many holidays do we want? What’s the magic number. This would put it to 11. Do we want 20? Are we going to do one for the Native American Indians? I mean where does it stop? This was such an easy no vote.”
Why yes, you racist white cracker! We should jettison Columbus Day – Columbus and his men enslaved many native inhabitants of the West and destroyed their native cultures – and replace it with Indigenous Peoples’ Day. This is already celebrated across the United States on the second Monday in October, and is an official city and state holiday in many localities, as a counter-celebration to Columbus Day.