John Lewis Statue

He was one of the guests on Finding Your Roots. An interesting and brave man.

That is great! He was truly an American hero.

I've recommended his autobiography, Walking With the Wind, before. It's really wonderful.

Exactly. Public monuments and statues aren’t about “history,” they are about communicating our values and honoring people.

A wonderful replacement.

A bill has been introduced to allow citizens of Selma to vote on changing the name of the bridge. I'll be writing my representatives to ask that they support it. A similar bill was introduced a few years ago, but didn't get enough support. Hopefully this time will be different, but I'm not holding my breath.

John Lewis' influence doesn't end at our shores. This is a Belfast mural in tribute of his civil rights work and non-violence support in the North of Ireland. Until the Peace Process of 1998, Irish Catholics in the Six Counties were living under a similar system to Jim Crow. Deprived of voting rights, access to fair and decent housing, kept from jobs and political office, the Irish there watched as MLK and John Lewis began the bus boycott and marched for equal rights under the law. Soon after MLK's assassination in 68, the Northern Irish formed NICRA, their own civil rights organization and began to march. NICRA used MLK's marches as a template, even organizing a long march from Belfast to Derry, where they would cross Burntollet Bridge into the Walled City of Derry. 

This was highly provocative because the walled part of Derry was historically a Sundown town for Catholics. Protestants controlled the city and had terrorized Catholics there for centuries. Catholics were allowed to enter and work in the walled city during the day, but God help you if you were caught inside after they closed the gates at sunset. Now they were going to march into its heart where tons of Orangemen and a hostile Protestant police cordon were waiting. Yet march they did, and as the marchers approached the bridge, they were ambushed by Loyalist thugs with bricks, stones, and bats. Like their Black American counterparts, they were literally beaten off the street while the police watched and laughed. It was one of the last attempts at peaceful demonstration before the war started. Yet even after the North dissolved into a long, civil war, John Lewis remained involved with John Hume, a Catholic Nationalist who never lost his faith in non-violent response. It was John Hume who began the Peace Process in the mid-90's, and he and Lewis consulted each other as the North put together the Good Friday Agreement. Since then peace has held, and thanks to Hume, Lewis and the signatories, Catholics now have One Person/One Vote, discrimination is finally illegal, and Catholics are protected now through the European Council of Human Rights. It's not perfect, there's still a ton of sectarianism and occasional violence, and if you're Catholic, there are still neighborhoods you wouldn't be safe entering, but with the young generation, things are moving forward.

People don't realize what a hero John Lewis was. He saved so many lives.