2013 Emancipation Day Fireworks on Pennsylvania Ave NW.

Victoria Pickering / Flickr

It’s nearly Emancipation Day again in the District—on April 16, the city will celebrate 157 years since it freed 3,100 enslaved people from bondage. The anniversary became an official public holiday in 2005, and since then, it’s been celebrated each year with speeches, concerts, parades, and fireworks.

This year is no different: on Saturday, the District will hold a parade in honor of the holiday, starting at 10th Street NW and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, and ending four blocks later at 14th Street NW (here’s the route). The parade starts at 2 p.m.

After the parade, there’s a free concert  at Freedom Plaza from 3 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., featuring musical acts like Faith Evans, Mya, Doug E. Fresh, Kenny Lattimore, Master Gee of the Sugar Hill Gang, Ayanna Gregory, Spur of the Moment Band, and several more acts.

Abraham Lincoln signed the Compensated Emancipation Act on April 16, 1862, more than eight months before he signed the Emancipation Proclamation that would free all the enslaved people in the country. The legislation paid out $1 million to compensate former slave owners for freeing enslaved persons. Here’s what the legislation says, in part:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That all persons held to service or labor within the District of Columbia by reason of African descent are hereby discharged and freed of and from all claim to such service or labor; and from and after the passage of this act neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except for crime, whereof the party shall be duly convicted, shall hereafter exist in said District.

Elected officials in D.C. have often used the holiday to advocate further for statehood, arguing that the District’s citizens continue to lack full citizenship due to their lack of representation in Congress. It’s gotten national attention in years past, when it has pushed back the tax filing deadline for the entire country.

“Now I recognize of course that there are no slaves living in the District of Columbia today,” said District Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton in a speech about Emancipation Day this week. “But there is not a single free and equal citizen living in the District of Columbia.”

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