Every month has a credible claim to the title of “American Freedom Month,” none more so than June.
Perhaps it’s the excitement of summer or the joy that comes with the longest day of the year. Regardless, it seems the forward and backward tides of American politics are only emphasized in June. The 30 days between the end of May and the beginning of July have done more to shape the American republic than any other.
Even since the beginning of the country, June has been historically dynamic. On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia stood before the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and resolved “that these United Colonies, and that they should be free and independent States, that they be released from all allegiance to the British Crown, and from all ties politics between him and the United Kingdom, and we want to be free from oppressive colonialism, he said the right to celebrate the Fourth of July as the country’s official birthday, but labor and delivery began with Lee’s resolution on June 7.
America’s second birth of freedom also happened in June, on Juneteenth. On that day – June 19, 1865 – Abraham Lincoln’s promise of emancipation for all enslaved people was finally fulfilled. It was then that Union General Gordon Granger rode to Galveston, Texas, and read Executive Order No. 3: “The people of Texas are informed that, according to the proclamation of the (president) of the United States, all slaves are free. This includes the absolute equality of personal rights and property rights between former masters and slaves. More than two months after Lee surrendered at Appomattox, The scourge of chattel slavery has officially ended. Now, every June 19th is Juneteenth.
June 6 – D-Day – has become the most important day for American independence. In 1944, the United States and its Allied partners launched the largest amphibious assault in world history. Freeing our friends overseas from the aggression of Nazi Germany is one of the noblest and most important goals of America’s mission of freedom. It is also the sole validation of the state as a paragon of freedom.
Seventy-two years earlier, various types of raids took place when Susan B. Anthony and a group of brave women pushed their way to Rochester, New York, the polling location to cast ballots in the presidential election. It was illegal for women to vote then, but that didn’t stop Anthony. He was arrested and, in June 1873, put on trial. Verdict? He was fined $100 for unlawful conduct, a penalty he did not receive. Questionable moral rules often produce fearless liberal pioneers.
Then there is the Supreme Court. June is a unique month in the judicial calendar, as judges complete their work and produce many written opinions, which leads to an unprecedented growth in civil liberties in six months of the year. The right to privacy was recognized in Griswold v. Connecticut on June 7, 1965. More than a year later, on June 13, 1966, the accused were given important protection through the Miranda court decision. Freedom of speech and the press was proclaimed twice in one month in 1971 when The New York Times published the famous Pentagon Papers on June 13, and six members of the Supreme Court defended the controversial publication 17 days later. Capital punishment was temporarily stopped by the court in June 1972. The court’s landmark recognition of same-sex marriage in Obergefell v. Hodges arrived on June 26, 2015. I can continue. Of course, in recent years, the court has condensed and even stopped the expansion of individual rights – think Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization – but still. For this moment in history, the balance of the month of June is far more favorable to individual freedom, personal rights and fulsome freedom.
June’s declaration of American Freedom Month would be incomplete without pausing to honor those who died for freedom. Civil rights leader Medgar Evers was assassinated on June 12, 1963. Three civil rights activists — James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner — were assassinated on or around June 21, 1964. Almost four years later, Robert F. Kennedy was shot. Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. The Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for the White House, Kennedy recently announced his commitment to broad civil rights legislation. He and many other freedom fighters deserve respect.
America’s very symbol of freedom – the Stars and Stripes – was conceived in June. It was June 14, 1777, to be exact, the commemorative day that is now celebrated as Flag Day. At that time John Adams faced the Continental Congress and decided, “The flag of the thirteen states of the United States (will) be thirteen stripes, red and white alternately, if the union be thirteen stars, white on a blue field, representing the new constellation. .” George Washington added to Adams’ description. descendants who represent freedom.”
On June 3, 1964, Rev. Martin Luther King stood before a packed audience at Arizona State University and admitted that “the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.” Two weeks later, on June 19 – Juneteenth! – The Senate passed the most comprehensive civil rights legislation in American history. As America prepares for a fun summer, let’s raise a glass to June, American Freedom Month.
