Bill Text: HI SCR59 | 2015 | Regular Session | Introduced

---

Bill Title: Juneteenth National Freedom Day; June 19

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 6-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2015-03-13 - Referred to HEA. [SCR59 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2015-SCR59-Introduced.html

---

THE SENATE	S.C.R. NO.	59
TWENTY-EIGHTH LEGISLATURE, 2015
STATE OF HAWAII

SENATE CONCURRENT

RESOLUTION

 

 

recognizing juneteenth national freedom day on june 19 of each year.

 

 

     WHEREAS, more than one hundred thirty years old, Juneteenth National Freedom Day is the oldest and only African-American holiday observance in the United States; and

 

     WHEREAS, also known as Emancipation Day, Emancipation Celebration, Freedom Day, Jun-Jun, and Juneteenth, Juneteenth National Freedom Day commemorates the strong survival instinct of African-Americans who were first brought to this country stacked in the bottom of slave ships in a month-long journey across the Atlantic Ocean known as the Middle Passage; and

 

     WHEREAS, approximately 11.5 million African-Americans survived the voyage to the New World - the number that died is likely greater - only to be subjected to whipping, castration, branding, and rape, and forced to submit to slavery for more than two hundred years after arrival in the United States; and

 

     WHEREAS, events in the history of the United States that led to the Civil War of 1861 centered around sectional differences between the North and South that were based on the economic and social divergence caused by the existence of slavery; and

 

     WHEREAS, Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as President of the United States in 1861, and as President, Lincoln believed and stated that the paramount object of the Civil War was to save the Union rather than save or destroy slavery; and

 

     WHEREAS, Lincoln also stated his wish that all men everywhere could be free, thus adding to a growing anticipation by slaves that their ultimate liberation was at hand; and

 

     WHEREAS, in 1862, the first clear sign that the end of slavery was imminent came when laws abolishing slavery in the territories of Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Oklahoma were passed; and

 

     WHEREAS, in September of that same year, President Lincoln warned the eleven rebellious Confederate States that if they did not return to the Union by January 1, 1863, he would declare their slaves forever free via the celebrated Emancipation Proclamation; and

 

     WHEREAS, enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation, however, only occurred in Confederate States once under Union Army control, and Congress subsequently passed the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution on January 31, 1865, abolishing slavery throughout the United States and its territories; and

 

     WHEREAS, news of this action reached the states at different times, and it was not until June 19, 1865, that the message of freedom reached the slaves in Arkansas, California, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas; and

 

     WHEREAS, spontaneous celebrations erupted throughout the country when African-Americans learned of their freedom; and

 

     WHEREAS, Juneteenth National Freedom Day celebrates the abolishment of slavery with excitement and great joy and is a reminder to all Americans of the status and importance of Americans of African descent as American citizens; now, therefore,

 

     BE IT RESOLVED by the Senate of the Twenty-eighth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2015, the House of Representatives concurring, that this body recognizes Juneteenth National Freedom Day on June 19 of each year; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a certified copy of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the Governor.

 

 

 

	OFFERED BY:	_____________________________

Report Title:

Juneteenth National Freedom Day; June 19