NPR's Ailsa Chang talks with poet and lawyer CeLillianne Green about the history behind Juneteenth and what it means at this moment.

CHANG: Now in 2020, this day is called Juneteenth, and it's become a day to commemorate the end of chattel slavery in America.

GREEN: Well, I like to think that these people who were unexpected to know that that day would come when they would be told that they were free - they had no indication that there had been an Emancipation Proclamation that became effective on January the 1 of 1865.

But the vibrational frequency of the word free seeped into their spirit in a way that we can't even imagine today that brought a feeling of joy, of jubilation, the idea that they could walk and be human beings as God had intended them to be and consistent with the Declaration of Independence, which states that we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men - all people are created equal, endowed by their creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

And these individuals who got word that they were finally free on that day, were they really the last enslaved people to be set free from chattel slavery in America?