Why Juneteenth?

“A bit of a made-up holiday, isn’t it?” asked an acquaintance after Juneteenth was recognized as a national holiday three summers ago. He wasn’t questioning why we would celebrate the ending of slavery in America—he was quibbling with the date itself:

“The first ‘Juneteenth’ came two and a half years after Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation and six months before the 13th Amendment was ratified. If we’re going to celebrate the end of slavery, why not pick one of those dates?”