MIAMI (June 19, 2021) - FIU Athletics is proud to celebrate Juneteenth on Saturday, June 19, in observance of the end of slavery in the United States.

Juneteenth commemorates the anniversary of June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers landed in Galveston, Texas and proclaimed that slavery in the United States
had ended and the Civil War was over. 

The events in Galveston were two and a half years after President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. The Emancipation Proclamation didn't have much impact on the Texans due to the low number of Union troops stationed in the state to enforce the new Executive Order. With Confederate General Lee's surrender in April of 1865 and the arrival of Union General Granger's regiment, the forces were finally strong enough to influence and enforce the slave's freedom. 

On June 17, 2021, President Joe Biden signed legislation establishing Juneteenth as a US federal holiday, making it the first federal holiday established since Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983. FIU Athletics is proud to lend our voice in celebration of this liberating moment in our history.