Today is Monday, June the 19th, 2023.

Welcome to the Daily Article Podcast.

I'm Chris Elkins, narrating today's article written by Denison Forum co-founder and CEO, Dr. Jim Denison.

According to the Smithsonian Institution, June 19th marks our country's second Independence Day.

On this day in 1865, some 2,000 Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay, Texas,

where they announced that the more than 250,000 enslaved black people in the state were free by executive decree.

The day became known as Juneteenth by the newly freed people in Texas and eventually became a federal holiday.

As such, today illustrates the path to cultural transformation our nation urgently needs.

President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation declared all enslaved people in the Confederate States legally free on January 1, 1863.

However, as the Smithsonian explains, quote, not everyone in Confederate territory would immediately be free.

Even though the Emancipation Proclamation was effective in 1863, it could not be implemented

in places still under Confederate control." End quote. As a result, in the westernmost Confederate

state of Texas, enslaved people would not be free for another two years. Even after the Civil

War ended and the 13th Amendment legally

ended slavery, some former Confederate soldiers still tried to round up black quote unquote runaways

and return them to their owners while white vigilantes tracked down and punished former enslaved people.

Susan Merritt of Russ County, Texas,

recounted what happened when some black people in Texas

tried to claim their freedom.

Quote, lots of Negroes were killed after freedom.

Bushwhacked, shot down while they were trying to get away.

You could see lots of Negroes hanging from trees in Sabine Bottom

...