New Year's Day Is Also Emancipation Day.

[elleng]

'Our nation must fulfill the hopes unleashed by the Emancipation Proclamation.

By Jesse L. Jackson Sr.
Mr. Jackson is the founder and president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition.

“Then Moses said to the people, ‘Commemorate this day, the day you came out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, because the Lord brought you out of it with a mighty hand.’” — Exodus: 13:3.

Late in the night of Dec. 31, in African-American churches across the country, congregants gather to welcome the new year. They sing songs of freedom and overcoming. They testify to how far their faith has brought them and how much faith and courage they will need to face another year.

The tradition is called Watch Night, and it dates back 156 years to when President Abraham Lincoln set forth an essential document of freedom that most Americans have probably never read or thought much about: the Emancipation Proclamation.

The night before the proclamation went into effect on Jan. 1, 1863, free blacks in the North and their enslaved brothers and sisters in the South sat vigil in churches, in shabby slave shacks and in moonlit plantation woods to watch, pray and hope throughout the night to hear news that Lincoln’s promises of freedom had been officially issued and millions of our ancestors were legally free.'>>>

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/30/opinion/new-years-day-emancipation-proclamation.html?

[RestoreAmerica2020]

1. Thanks for post! Excellent article. Rev. Jackson''s eloquence lends to the historical context of

of Emancipation Day along with end- of-year tradition of Watch Night. Also, Rev Jacskon notes that this particular new years day, Jan 1, 2019, has a dual significance and here's why:

Snip

For every American who cherishes freedom and democracy, New Year’s Day should mean far more than college bowl games and parades. The nation must revive and reclaim the true meaning and significance of Jan. 1, Emancipation Day.

This Jan. 1 is even more significant in that the year 2019 marks the 400th anniversary of the first documented African slaves’ forced arrival on the shores of the New World that was to become the United States of America. This anniversary year should be a time of commemoration and celebration, reflection — and action — on how far we have come and how far we must still travel to reach the mountaintop.

[Nitram]

2. How did enslaved people know the proclamation was going to be made January 1, 1863?

"The night before the proclamation went into effect on Jan. 1, 1863, free blacks in the North and their enslaved brothers and sisters in the South sat vigil in churches, in shabby slave shacks and in moonlit plantation woods to watch, pray and hope throughout the night to hear news that Lincoln’s promises of freedom had been officially issued and millions of our ancestors were legally free."