Twitter and Square Make Juneteenth a Company Holiday

Twitter and Square on Tuesday designated Juneteenth, which celebrates the end of slavery in America, as a company holiday — the latest conciliatory overtures by major corporations since the widespread protests over police brutality and the death of George Floyd.

The initiative was announced on social media by Jack Dorsey, the chief executive and a founder of Twitter and Square, a mobile payment company. The announcement came on the same day as the funeral for Mr. Floyd, the black man who died last month after a Minneapolis police officer put his knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes.

Businesses large and small, from the National Football League to independent shops, have re-examined their policies and social responsibility to combat systemic racism in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.

The holiday got its name by combining the words June and nineteenth. On June 19, 1865, Union soldiers landing in Galveston, Texas, told the slaves there that they were free and that the Civil War had ended — more than two years after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

“Both Twitter and Square are making #Juneteenth (June 19th) a company holiday in the U.S., forevermore,” Mr. Dorsey wrote on Twitter. “A day for celebration, education, and connection.”

Forty-seven states recognize Juneteenth as a state holiday, but efforts to make it a national holiday have stalled in Congress. For many African-Americans, it is considered an independence day.