Congressman John Lewis was recognized many times, and rightly so, throughout his life for his extraordinary courage, leadership and commitment to civil rights.
Congressman Lewis’ efforts promoting civil rights started at an early age. As a student, he organized sit-in demonstrations at segregated lunch counters in Nashville, and was later beaten by angry mobs for his participation in the Freedom Rides that challenged segregation at bus terminals across the south. By the age of 23, he was Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), a student group for civil rights. Under Lewis’ leadership, the SNCC organized one of the most dramatic nonviolent protests of the Movement. Along with fellow activist Hosea Williams, Lewis led a 600-strong demonstration that exploded into a confrontation when Alabama State Troopers attacked marchers. Known as “Bloody Sunday,” that fateful march and the subsequent march between Selma and Montgomery, Alabama led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. As a member of the U.S. Congress representing Georgia’s fifth congressional district, John Lewis dedicated his life to protecting human rights.
John Lewis, who went from being the youngest leader of the 1963 March on Washington to a long-serving congressman from Georgia and icon of the civil rights movement, died Friday. He was 80. In December 2019, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.
″(A)ll these years later, he is known as the Conscience of the United States Congress, still speaking his mind on issues of justice and equality,” Obama said in 2011, as he was bestowing the Medal of Freedom. “And generations from now, when parents teach their children what is meant by courage, the story of John Lewis will come to mind – an American who knew that change could not wait for some other person or some other time; whose life is a lesson in the fierce urgency of now.”
“Today, America mourns the loss of one of the greatest heroes of American history: Congressman John Lewis, the Conscience of the Congress,“ House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said late yesterday.