Juneteenth marks the day U.S. General Gordon Granger showed up in Galveston, Texas to let the enslaved people know the Union won the Civil War and slavery had been abolished. Though they’d had two and a half years to do it, their owners had never found the right time to let them know.
But had slavery been abolished?
Well, not really. It just changed form.
Today, slavery happens inside US prisons. In California, for example, where the state forces most of its incarcerated population to work jobs like construction, hospice care, and programming, earning as little as 8 cents per hour. Fun fact: Until recently, when fireflighting slaves got out of prison, California didn’t allow them to legally work as firefighters. Today, they can but it’s difficult.
Another fun fact: California courts tried to reduce prison overcrowding but our current VP Kamala Harris blocked the ruling when she was Attorney General in order to keep California supplied with plenty of slave labor. That’s literally what her lawyers argued in court. If California reduces prison overcrowding, the state will lose out on forced labor.
Anyway. Sorry to bum you out. I hope your day off is nice and that at some point the US actually stops enslaving people.
Note: A previous version said California doesn’t allow. It’s been corrected to say California didn’t allow.
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