In what is now known as Juneteenth, on June 19, 1865, Union
soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas with news that the Civil
War is over and slavery in the United States is abolished.

A mix of June and 19th, Juneteenth has become a day to
commemorate the end of slavery in America.

Despite the fact that President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was issued more than two years earlier on January
1, 1863, a lack of Union troops in the rebel state of Texas made
the order difficult to enforce.

Some historians blame the lapse in time on poor communication
in that era, while others believe Texan slave-owners purposely
withheld the information.

Abraham Lincoln 
(February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865)

June 18, 1812: The day after the Senate followed the House of Representatives in voting to declare war against Great Britain,
President James Madison signed the declaration into law—and
the War of 1812 began.

The American war declaration, opposed by a sizable minority
in Congress, had been called in response to the British
economic blockade of France, the induction of American
seaman into the British Royal Navy against their will,  and
the British support of Indian tribes along the Great Lakes  
frontier.     

A faction of Congress known as the “War Hawks” had
been advocating war with Britain for several years and
had not hidden their hopes that a U.S. invasion of Canada
might result in significant territorial land gains for the
United States.         

Archaeologists at George Washington’s Mount Vernon have
discovered dozens of glass jars filled with fruit preserves in
the cellar of the historic Northern Virginia home that "likely
haven’t seen the light of day since before the American
Revolution."

A press release Friday said Twenty-nine of the 35 bottles 
remain intact, and all contain either cherries, gooseberries 
or currants.

On June 12, 1987, in one of his most famous Cold War speeches, President Ronald Reagan challenged Soviet Leader Mikhail
Gorbachev to “tear down” the Berlin Wall, a symbol of the
repressive Communist era in a divided Germany.

President Coolidge stands with four Osage Indians at a White House ceremony.

On this day in 1924, President Calvin Coolidge signed into
law the Indian Citizenship Act, which granted citizenship
to all Native Americans born in the United States, many
of whom had served in the armed forces during World
War I.

While the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States
Constitution defines a citizen as any persons born in
the United States and subject to its laws and jurisdiction,
the amendment had previously been interpreted by the
courts not to apply to Native peoples.

Calvin Coolidge (July 4, 1872 – January 5, 1933)