The holiday, which commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans, is usually celebrated with parades and festivals, but has taken on new meaning after George Floyd’s killing.
DETROIT — Protesters marched over the Brooklyn Bridge, chanted “We want justice now!” near St. Louis’ Gateway Arch, prayed in Atlanta and paused for a moment of silence at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, as Americans marked Juneteenth Friday with new urgency amid protests to demand racial justice.
The holiday, which commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans, is usually celebrated with parades and festivals but became a day of protest this year in the wake of nationwide demonstrations set off by George Floyd’s killing at the hands of police in Minneapolis.
In addition to the traditional cookouts and readings of the Emancipation Proclamation – the Civil War-era order that declared all slaves free in Confederate territory – Americans of all backgrounds were marching, holding sit-ins or car caravan protests.
Thousands of people gathered at a religious rally in Atlanta. Hundreds marched from St. Louis’ Old Courthouse, where the Dred Scott case partially played out, a pivotal one that denied citizenship to African Americans but ended up galvanizing the anti-slavery movement. Protesters and revelers held signs and pushed baby strollers in Dallas, danced to a marching band in Chicago, and, in Detroit, registered people to vote and encouraged them to participate in the Census.
“Now we have the attention of the world, and we are not going to let this slide,” said Charity Dean, director of Detroit’s office of Civil Rights, Inclusion and Opportunity, who spoke during an event that called for an end to police brutality and racial equality, and which drew hundreds of people.
Events marking Juneteenth were planned in every major American city on Friday, although some were being held virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic. At some events, like in Chicago and New York, participants packed together, though many wore masks; at others, masks were scarce.
In Nashville, Tennessee, about two dozen Black men, most wearing suits, quietly stood arm in arm Friday morning in front of the city’s criminal courts. Behind them was a statue of Justice Adolpho Birch, the first African American to serve as chief justice of the Tennessee Supreme Court.
