06/19/2026
June 19, 1865, over 2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, Union Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, and issued General Order No. 3, which officially enforced the Emancipation Proclamation and liberated the remaining 250,000 enslaved African Americans in the state. Celebrate Juneteenth, our country's second independence day.