The American civil war ended on this day. It should be a national holiday

By Steve Phillips, The Guardian

Rather than celebrate this milestone of multiracial democracy, our leaders conspicuously ignore the occasion

Today should be a national holiday in the United States, but the wrong people are celebrating. On this day in 1865, Confederate Gen Robert E Lee surrendered to Union forces – marking the effective defeat of the Confederacy and the triumph of those who opposed the idea that this should be a white nationalist nation where Black bodies could be bought and sold on the open market. Yet rather than celebrate this seminal milestone in defending and creating a multiracial democracy, the country’s leaders ignore the occasion, creating a vacuum into which the champions of white nationalism happily goose-step.

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The day not only recalls the defeat of the white supremacists, but the beginning of the first faltering steps towards making the country a multiracial democracy. During Reconstruction, laws were passed, land divided and institutions created to foster education and public health for people of all racial backgrounds. In the words of the writer Nikole Hannah-Jones, “the years directly after slavery saw the greatest expansion of human and civil rights this nation would ever see”.

One would think that such a landmark achievement would be annually remembered, recognized and cherished. But one would be wrong. It is in fact the Confederates and their ideological and genealogical heirs who regularly nurture the memories of those who fought for legalized white supremacy within our borders.

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For the health of our democracy, the education of our children, and the elevation of the vision and values that this is a nation where people of all racial backgrounds are cherished, we should launch a movement from coast to coast to make 9 April a holiday.

Read the compelling argument by Phillips.

Learn more about reconstruction.

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