
Originally published 6.19.19 by The Takeaway, WNYC Studios — On this Juneteenth, or June 19, we celebrate the end of slavery in the United States 154 years ago. Members of Congress chose this symbolic day to hold hearings on a reparations bill. The bill, if it passes, will establish a commission to determine whether — and if so, how — the US government owes anything to the descendants of enslaved people. To…