As the Fourth of July draws near, Coloradans should prepare to celebrate Juneteenth first. It's a celebration of what's right with the United States. Gov. Jared Polis signed a bill last week making it an official state holiday. President Joe Biden made it a federal holiday in 2021.

Juneteenth has for too long been an afterthought. A Gallup poll in 2021 found that 60% of Americans know "nothing at all" or only "a little bit" about Juneteenth. That could change if K-12 schools would teach honest history, rather than anti-American ideologies that tell minority children they are helplessly oppressed. Elementary schools should ensure all children understand Juneteenth, which celebrates our country's rejection of slavery — an institution that continues around the globe.

The Fourth of July is and should remain a premier summer celebration. Formally "Independence Day," the federal and state holiday celebrates the liberation of 13 original colonies from the tyranny of British monarch King George III.

We would not have a genuine "Independence Day" on July 4 — one that makes sense to all Americans — without the events that led to Juneteenth.

We celebrate Juneteenth on June 19th. On that day in 1865, Union Army Gen. Gordon Granger announced General Order No. 3. It enforced emancipation in Texas — the last Confederate state with institutionalized slavery.

Despite President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation to end slavery in 1863, portions of Texas and two Union border states — Delaware and Kentucky — continued holding slaves. Biden, a longtime ally of segregationists, has a history of reminding us.

"My state (Delaware) was a slave state. My state is a border state," then-Sen. Biden boasted in 2006 when asked how he would appeal to southerners as a northeast Democrat.

General Order No. 3 led to the enforcement of emancipation in all remaining slave enclaves. The official end of slavery came in 1866 after Confederate-friendly Indian tribes released slaves from Indian territories.

Before our country took action to free all slaves, July 4th was nothing for Black people to celebrate. They weren't independent in the least.

No one said it better than escaped slave and statesman Frederick Douglass. A famed orator, he was invited to speak on July 4th in his hometown of Rochester, New York, in 1852. Douglass spoke but refused to celebrate.

"The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common," Douglass said. "The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought life and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn."

Indeed. He appealed to decency and helped bring about change. Fourteen years later the last of his country's slaves went free after anti-slavery Americans fought and died in a war that led to emancipation.

Only after the last slaves walked free was this a country that genuinely stood for independence.

Much of the world has refused to follow our lead. World Population Review estimates that India enslaves 8 million. China has 3.9 million slaves who make sneakers and attire marketed by American celebrities who denounce racism. North Korea enslaves 2.6 million. About 1.4 million Black people are slaves in Nigeria.

As the land of the free, our country has everything to celebrate. Religious and ethnic minorities from around the globe break into this country because it opposes oppression and upholds liberty. We pursue color-blind freedom culturally, institutionally and by force of law.

Let's celebrate independence this summer like never before. Start with Juneteenth, a holiday that makes July 4th a day we all may enjoy.

REPRINTED FROM THE COLORADO SPRINGS GAZETTE

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