PITTSBURGH (Newsradio KDKA) - The Emancipation Proclamation declared the freedom for all enslaved people in the states in 1863.
"You can have a law, but if it's not enforced then how effective is it going to be?" Said Samuel W. Black, director of the African American Program at the Heinz History Center.
What Black means is that some slave owners in Texas were unwilling to give up the free labor.
Juneteenth was the response of black people to their freedom in Texas, two years after the initiation of the Emancipation Proclamation, Black said.
"Juneteenth became that cultural observance beginning in 1866," said Black, "to recognize their freedom in the state of Texas, and it became an annual observance and it kind of grew and evolved into what we see it as today."
Listen to the full interview above to learn more.