[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 135 (Thursday, July 30, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Page S4625]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Remembering John Lewis
Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. President, on February 21, 1940, John Lewis was
born in Troy, AL--a son of sharecroppers, born to be a person to bring
good trouble to the Nation. He grew up on his family's farm and
attended segregated public schools in Pike County, AL.
As a young boy, he was inspired by the activism that surrounded him--
the Montgomery bus boycott and the works of a leader name Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. He attended Fisk University, and he organized
sit-in demonstrations in segregated lunch counters in Nashville, TN.
In 1961, he started participating in the Freedom Rides. He was just a
young man. He would get on board a segregated bus, and he would dare to
sit in the ``Whites Only'' area just to make a simple statement--that
any person of any race should be able to sit anywhere they choose to
sit in America, and it would be OK. He literally risked his life just
riding on a bus in the wrong seat.
He became best known in 1963 when he helped to organize the March on
Washington. He was part of what they called the Big Six in the civil
rights movement. He was nationally recognized. We lose track of the
fact that in 1963 he was one of the keynote speakers in the March on
Washington. He stood in front of the Lincoln Memorial at 23 years old.
His focus on nonviolent protests, his focus on training people on how
to speak out for what is just and for what is right, his focus on
challenging people to rethink justice and to be able to see all people
as being created in the image of God, all people equal, was a message
that our Nation needed to hear and was a message he delivered over and
over again. From his youngest days, he brought good trouble, as he
said, to our Nation to awaken us.
He led 600 peaceful, orderly protesters across the Edmund Pettus
Bridge in Selma, AL, on March 7, 1965. They were going to march from
Selma to Montgomery to demonstrate the need for voting rights changes
in the State of Alabama, but Alabama State Troopers met them there in
what is known as Bloody Sunday. He and other peaceful protesters,
simply marching, were attacked and beaten for doing what is just.
It was a telling thing to see John Lewis's body this past week cross
that historic bridge one last time, and as he crossed, to have Alabama
State Troopers stand on the bridge and salute his body as it went by
because John Lewis brought change to America.
John Lewis was elected to Congress in 1986 in Georgia's Fifth
Congressional District, where he served faithfully. He was
affectionately known as being the conscience of the Congress.
He was trained in religious teachings. He had a theological degree.
He was often called ``the reverend.'' He never lost track of his faith.
He treated people with respect. Even people he disagreed with and voted
differently from, he would treat them with respect in a way that would
honor God and honor them and honor his own family.
What is interesting, some of the statements John Lewis has made over
the years always struck me. His quiet demeanor and his stern way of
addressing justice always came back to his faith. A statement he made
in 2004 really sticks with me. He said:
I'm deeply concerned that many people today fail to realize
that the movement was built on deep-seated religious
convictions, and the movement grew out of a sense of faith--
faith in God and faith in one's fellow human beings.
Many of us who were participants in this movement saw our
involvement as an extension of our faith.
He said:
We saw ourselves doing the work of the Almighty.
Segregation and racial discrimination were not in keeping
with our faith, and so we had to do something.
And he did.
Representative Lewis left a long legacy as a civil rights leader. He
will not be forgotten in our Nation. The Big Six leaders made
significant changes. I think about those changes he saw just in his
lifetime and the changes that he, personally, was engaged in making in
our Nation. Representative Lewis once made the statement: ``When people
tell me nothing has changed, I tell them, come walk in my shoes and I
will show you change'' because Representative Lewis, just in his
lifetime, in the battles he fought, led, and changed, changed
segregated schools in America; took away segregated water fountains in
America; took away segregated movie theaters in America; took away
segregated public transport in America; changed how people applied for
jobs, got jobs, enjoyed their jobs; changed the opportunities for a
person being able to live wherever they wanted to live in America;
changed even how we vote in giving equal access for every American to
be able to get to the ballot and vote. That is just in John Lewis's
lifetime. He left a legacy of change.
His nonviolent protests, his training in leading people, stands in
stark contrast to what I see some people who call it protests are doing
right now. When I see what is happening right now in Portland every
night and watching individuals gear up and literally attacking Federal
law enforcement, throwing Molotov cocktails at them, pointing laser
pointers at their eyes, shooting large-scale fireworks at them, trying
to set a building on fire--when I watch that and those individuals
trying to say they are protesting for justice--they are not protesting
for what is just. John Lewis was protesting for what is just.
John Lewis made the change in America, led a Nation and led a
generation, even as a young 23-year-old man, to do the right thing in
the right way. The change that he brought is a gift to the generations
for millennia in our Nation.
With that, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska