A group of lawmakers has set out to make Juneteenth, the day commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S., a legal holiday in Vermont.

Juneteenth marks the day in 1865 when Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay, Texas, to let enslaved people there know that they had been freed — nearly two years after president Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021. It’s marked around the country, including in Vermont, with musical performances, festivals and parties.

More than half of U.S. states have followed the lead of the feds and have made Juneteenth a legal holiday with a paid day off for state workers, according to the Pew Research Center. Members of the Senate Committee on Government Operations will hear testimony on Friday on the holiday bill. Sen. Ruth Hardy (D-Addison), the committee chair, backs it.

“It’s a way for Black Vermonters, the relatives of slaves, to celebrate their freedom and their own emancipation and place in our history of our country for better and for worse,” Hardy said. “It’s an important discussion to have, and I hope we’re able to pass it.”

Christine Hughes, director of the Richard Kemp Center in Burlington, said several Vermont groups are working on issues of racial justice, including Juneteenth, in the current legislative session. She noted that her husband, Mark Hughes, is backing two bills sponsored by Rep. Brian Cina (P/D-Burlington): H.432, which would set up a task force to develop reparation proposals for slavery; and H.448, which would promote racial and social equity in economic opportunity.

Those bills are now before the House General and Housing Committee and are not likely to advance this year, said Rep. Tom Stevens (D-Waterbury), the committee chair.

"We have taken moving testimony on H.432 but not on H.448. I don't know that we will be able to take enough testimony on the bills prior to crossover," Stevens said, referring to an upcoming deadline for bills to pass out of one chamber into another in order to be passed into law in that year.

Christine Hughes said H.432 and H.448 would have a greater impact than the Juneteenth holiday bill.

“Juneteenth is significant for a lot of reasons, but having a holiday only goes so far,” she said. “We’re much more interested in pursuing and advocating and doing the work of policy that’s going to have a direct impact on peoples’ lives.”