John Lewis, civil rights icon and Iraq War opponent, dies aged 80

[Markhor]

The world loses one of freedom's biggest defenders.

John Lewis led protesters across the Selma Bridge in 1965, was knocked down by police and suffered a fractured skull, and many other protesters were beaten. These images were transmitted to the world who saw firsthand how savage racial discrimination was in the South.



He helped organise MLK's famous March on Washington. Time and again he stood not only for racial justice but social justice.

He opposed the 2003 Iraq War, with these words:

"What fruit will our actions bear, not just for us but for our children?" "And not just for the children of our own land, but the children of the West, and the Middle East, and the world?"

"What do our children gain when we have destroyed another nation? What do we gain when we have killed hundreds of thousands of their men, women, and children?" Lewis asked.

RIP. May a new generation take up the baton.

 

[Abdullah719]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="und" dir="ltr"><a href="https://t.co/tq76W9ExkF">pic.twitter.com/tq76W9ExkF</a></p>— Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (@kaj33) <a href="https://twitter.com/kaj33/status/1284358401460301828?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 18, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

[JaDed]

RIP, did a lot of civil rights and is a towering figure w.r.t but his district has high unemployment and poverty which he should had tried to fix.
His views on Bernie and support for Hilary are other major issues.

 

[Buffet]

Iconic civil rights activist.

 

[MenInG]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">John Lewis gave all he had to redeem America’s unmet promise of equality and justice for all, and to create a place for us to build a more perfect union together. In so doing he became the conscience of the nation.</p>— Bill Clinton (@BillClinton) <a href="https://twitter.com/BillClinton/status/1284339269587341312?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 18, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Not many of us get to live to see our own legacy play out in such a meaningful, remarkable way. John Lewis did:<a href="https://t.co/KbVfYt5CeQ">https://t.co/KbVfYt5CeQ</a></p>— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) <a href="https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/1284358592083169280?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 18, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

[MenInG]

A memorial service has been held for US civil rights icon John Lewis in his hometown of Troy, Alabama.

Mourners were required to wear masks at Troy University's Trojan Arena because of the coronavirus outbreak, and the number of visitors was limited to 800.

Lewis, a Democratic congressman, died last week of pancreatic cancer aged 80.

He was one of the "Big Six" civil rights leaders, which included Martin Luther King Jr, and helped organise the historic 1963 March on Washington.

He was a member of the House of Representatives from Georgia's 5th District, an area which covered most of the state capital, Atlanta.

Saturday's memorial service started several days of tributes that will culminate in Lewis lying in state in the rotunda of the US Capitol in Washington DC.

In December 2019, Lewis announced that he had been diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

"I have been in some kind of fight - for freedom, equality, basic human rights - for nearly my entire life," he said in a statement released at the time. "I have never faced a fight quite like the one I have now."

'He always was a fighter'

At the service in Troy, family members paid tributes to Lewis, describing him as a loving and fearless family man.

"He'd gravitate toward the least of us," said brother Henry Grant Lewis. "He worked a lifetime to help others."

"He always was a fighter," said sister Ethel Mae Tyner.

After the service, the hearse with Lewis' casket arrived at a chapel in Selma, Alabama, for a private remembrance.

On Sunday, the coffin will be taken to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where Lewis had his skull fractured by a state trooper during a rights march in 1965.

Later that day events will move to the state capital of Montgomery, where Lewis will lie in state.

Lewis will be buried on Thursday in Atlanta after a private service.

Who was Lewis?

During the civil rights movement, Lewis was one of the founders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and then became its chairman from 1963 to 1966.

He co-organised and spoke at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, the rally at which Dr King delivered his historic I Have a Dream speech.

Lewis was the last surviving speaker from the march.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53541416

 

[MenInG]

Obama: 'John Lewis will be a founding father of that fuller, fairer, better America'

“The life of John Lewis was in so many ways exceptional. It vindicated the faith in our founding, redeemed that faith. That most American of ideas, the idea that any of us ordinary people without rank or wealth or title or fame can someone point out the imperfections of this nation and come together and challenge the status quo and decide that it is in our power to remake this country.”

He brought this country “closer to our highest ideals,” Obama says.

“John Lewis will be a founding father of that fuller, fairer, better America.”

Obama says he knows later in Lewis’s life, his staff was stressed by thing like his overnight sit-in in Congress.

“He kept getting himself arrested,” Obama says. “As an old man, he didn’t sit out any fight.”