President Lincoln’s 1863 Emancipation Proclamation declaring Black men, women, and children held in bondage in rebellious states to be free was only as immediately potent as Union military victories made it. 1/7

2 1/2 years of struggle lay ahead before General Order No. 3 finally enforced the Proclamation in Texas on June 19, 1865, where the last vestiges of institutional Southern slavery rested. 2/7

On #Juneteenth , we recognize that the gulf between ideals and reality is often wide, and can only be bridged through the hard work of and commitment to ending institutions of systemic racial oppression that continue to fester - 3/7

because that aspect of the Civil War and the decades and centuries prior never ended when the guns went silent and soldiers went home. We see this in post-Reconstruction Jim Crow, in the treatment of indigenous Americans, 4/7

Japanese-American internment camps in places like Crystal City, our continued struggle toward meaningful immigration reform that does justice to Dreamers and their families who only know our great nation, 5/7

and in the fight for equitable post-Brown v. Board public education that continues today - among countless examples. 6/7

This is a day to reflect and also act. The great American experiment to form “a more perfect Union” rests with each of us and on our will to take responsibility into our hands to make it so. #TxEd #JUNETEENTH2020 7/7