When is Juneteenth?
Juneteenth National Independence Day is a US federal holiday. It was signed into law by President Joe Biden on Thursday June 17th 2021.

History of Juneteenth
On January 1st 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared the end of slavery with the Emancipation Proclamation. Two and half years later, and two months after the end of the Civil War, Union troops arrived in Galveston on June 19th 1865 to find that news of the proclamation had not yet reached Galveston and that people were still being held as slaves in Texas.

Juneteenth also known as Juneteenth Independence Day and Freedom Day, Juneteenth is a portmanteau word for June and nineteenth and commemorates the June 19th 1865 announcement of the abolition of slavery in Texas and the emancipation of African-American slaves throughout the Confederate South.

According to the National Juneteenth Observance Foundation, 49 states and the District of Columbia have passed legislation to officially recognize Juneteenth as a state holiday or special day of observance. - SOURCE

Rhode Island is not one of the states.

"The goal is to work with state officials and community partners to craft the legislation needed to make Juneteenth an official legal-paid state holiday in Rhode Island by June 19th, 2023."

- The MUSE Foundation of Rhode Island & JuneteenthRI

We need your help to make this happen. We are calling on the community and community organizations to make Juneteenth aka "Freedom Day" an official legal-paid state holiday in Rhode Island.