PHOTO OF THE DAY: JUNETEENTH

The United States Postal Service and federal offices across the country are closed today — Thursday, June 19 — in observance of Juneteenth, which is celebrated to commemorate the end of slavery in the United States. Juneteenth National Independence Day became a federal holiday in 2021 in response to June 19, 1865, when Major General Gordon Granger ordered the final enforcement of Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in Texas at the conclusion of the American Civil War. Slavery eventually came to an end in most regions across the country, and in December of 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution — which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude — was adopted, and the remaining enslaved persons in Delaware and Kentucky were freed.