Juneteenth Quotes to Celebrate Jubilee Day

Juneteenth is coming up and if you’re looking for some great quotes to share, we have put together a list of all the best Juneteenth quotes for kids your next post. And if you’re looking for short Juneteenth quotes to share, we also have you covered.

Now go ahead and browse through to find your favorite.

Juneteenth Quotes

“The day we were free—everyone was free. Why not make it a paid holiday? We deserve that…We want a day that is inclusive to everyone.” —Pharrell Williams

“Juneteenth has never been a celebration of victory or an acceptance of the way things are. It’s a celebration of progress. It’s an affirmation that despite the most painful parts of our history, change is possible—and there is still so much work to do.” —Barack Obama

“You can’t separate peace from freedom, because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.” — Malcolm X

“You must never, ever give out. We must keep the faith because we are one people. We are brothers and sisters. We all live in the same house: The American house.” — John Lewis

“We have suffered discrimination. We have suffered isolation and undermining. But we stand up for America, oftentimes when others who think they are more patriotic, who say they are more patriotic, do not.” —Maxine Waters

“Juneteenth may mark just one moment in the struggle for emancipation, but the holiday gives us an occasion to reflect on the profound contributions of enslaved Black Americans to the cause of human freedom.” —Jamelle Bouie

“Every June 19th is an opportunity for us to continue the momentum of memory, and the parade and the self-determination movements.” —Dr. Greg Carr

“Won’t it be wonderful when Black history and Native American history and Jewish history and all of U.S. history is taught from one book. Just U.S. history.” — Maya Angelou

“If the cruelties of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will surely fail. Because the goal of America is freedom, abused and scorned tho’ we may be, our destiny is tied up with America’s destiny.” —Martin Luther King Jr.

“There are still many causes worth sacrificing for, so much history yet to be made.” – Michelle Obama

“We all require and want respect, man or woman, Black or white. It’s our basic human right.” — Aretha Franklin

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.” — Ida B. Wells-Barnett

“Every Black person you meet is a miracle… We are valuable because of our humanity and declared valuable because our ancestors declared our worth when they fought for us to live.” —Brittany Packnett

“We Black folk, our history, and our present being are a mirror of all the manifold experiences of America… If we Black folk perish, America will perish.” —Richard Wright

“You need not be afraid to give us our rights for fear we will take too much — for we can’t take more than our pint’ll hold.” — Sojourner Truth

“What the people want is simple. They want an America as good as its promise.” —Barbara C. Jordan

“We are not ready to fight because we love fighting. We are ready to fight because we are worth fighting for.” – Zoé Samudzi

“There’s no other race, to me, that has such a tough history for hundreds and hundreds of years, and only the strong survive, so we were the strongest and the most mentally tough, and I’m really proud to wear this color every single day of my life.”—Serena Williams

“Even though the story has never been tidy, and Black folks have had to march and fight for every inch of our freedom, our story is nonetheless one of progress.” —Michelle Obama

“My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together.” – Desmond Tutu

“Human rights are something you were born with. Human rights are your God-given rights. Human rights are the rights that are recognized by all nations of this earth.” — Malcolm X

“The proclamation notes that freedom shall not be repressed. This is what I believe to be the primary significance of Juneteenth.” —Theodorea Regina Berry

“The 4th of July was never about Black people. Juneteenth is just for us. As Black people, we are told we don’t deserve our own holidays rooted in our own history. Everything is whitewashed. Juneteenth is for us… Juneteenth symbolizes the hope that my children and grandchildren will be free. It’s Black Joy and Black tenacity to survive.” — Tanesha Grant

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” — Barack Obama

“They can laugh, but they can’t deny us. They can curse and kill us but they can’t destroy us. This land is ours because we come out of it, we bled in it, our tears watered it, we fertilized it with our dead. So the more of us they destroy, the more it becomes filled with the spirit of our redemption.” —Ralph Ellison

“If you know whence you came, there is really no limit to where you can go.” — James Baldwin

“Hold those things that tell your history and protect them. During slavery, who was able to read or write or keep anything? The ability to have somebody to tell your story to is so important. It says: ‘I was here. I may be sold tomorrow. But you know I was here.’”- Maya Angelou

“Whether it’s freedom to express, freedom to live, freedom to earn, freedom to thrive, freedom to learn, whatever it is, I want to make sure that I’m a part of these spaces and opening doors.”—Angela Rye

“What historical narrative are we willing to weave in order to remind people not only that we were here enduring the trials but that we stared the fang toothed wolves of injustice in the face and said ‘no more.’” —Travon Free

“Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave.” – Frederick Douglass

“Understanding history is one of many ways to break the cycle. Lift up/amplify Black voices. Support Black owned businesses. Reach back. Mentor.” —Chadwick Boseman

“June 19th reminds me that I am the force of power to change this world and to follow in the footsteps of my ancestors to work towards liberation.” — Mariah Cooley

“Slavery is theft—theft of a life, theft of work, theft of any property or produce, theft even of the children a slave might have borne.” — Kevin Bales

“Throughout history, Juneteenth has been known by many names: Jubilee Day, Freedom Day, Liberation Day, Emancipation Day and, today, a national holiday.” — Kamala Harris

“We never got the 40 acres. We went all the way to Herbert Hoover, and we never got the 40 acres. We didn’t get the mule. So we decided we’d ride this donkey as far as it would take us.” —Rev. Al Sharpton

“Struggle is a never ending process. Freedom is never really won, you earn it and win it in every generation.” – Coretta Scott King

“If people can be taught to hate, they can be taught to love. But we need to know, you can’t erase history. So, let’s learn from it and be damned sure it doesn’t happen again.” — Opal Lee

“We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” — Martin Luther King Jr.

“There are two ways of exerting one’s strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.” — Booker T. Washington

“Today on Juneteenth, the day we celebrate the end of slavery, the day we memorialize those who offered us hope for the future and the day when we renew our commitment to the struggle for freedom.” —Angela Davis

“It’s an opportunity to both look back but to look ahead to make sure that that notion of freedom and the fragility of it is always protected and celebrated.” —Lonnie Bunch

“Freedom is not something that one people can bestow on another as a gift. They claim it as their own and none can keep it from them.” —Kwame Nkruma

“Juneteenth is another moment for me and my loved ones to build an archive of truth and experience of (ourselves) Black folks.” —Tatiana Glover

“I would like to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free… so other people would be also free.” —Rosa Parks

“Early on, the spelling of the holiday was not yet fixed, often appearing as ‘June ‘teenth,’ ‘June-teenth,’ or ‘June teenth.’ The Dictionary of American Regional English records another variant Texan form, ‘June the tenth,’ The legend is that the ‘teenth’ is because the news is delivered on different days to different groups.” — Leslie Wilson

juneteenth quotes

“Juneteenth is important to me because till this day black people are still subject to racial injustice on a global scale, and are still victims of racial abuse regardless of where they are from. Juneteenth allows us to remember how far black people have progressed since and it is a reminder of the strength we have within us.” — Bethel Kyeza

“If there is just about anything to rejoice it can be my ancestors, African People who survived the atrocity and stain of slavery… I honor them these days with a guarantee that I will keep on to combat for your unexplored desires and hopes.” —Viola Davis

“Ours is not the struggle of one day, one week or one year. Ours is not the struggle of one judicial appointment or presidential term. Ours is the struggle of a lifetime, or maybe even many lifetimes, and each one of us in every generation must do our part.” — John Lewis

“We have simply got to make people aware that none of us are free until we’re all free, and we aren’t free yet.”— Opal Lee

So that is it for our list of Juneteenth Quotes for Kids. We hope you found the perfect one for you!

If you like these, you might also want to check out our other lists of Happy June Quotes, June Letter Board Quotes, Summer Solstice Quotes and Summer Aesthetic Quotes.