2020 -- H 8176

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     STATE OF RHODE ISLAND

IN GENERAL ASSEMBLY

JANUARY SESSION, A.D. 2020

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H O U S E   R E S O L U T I O N

EXPRESSING DEEPEST CONDOLENCES ON THE PASSING OF THE HONORABLE

JOHN LEWIS

     Introduced By: Representatives Hull, Shekarchi, Casimiro, Kennedy, and Lima

     Date Introduced: December 14, 2020

     Referred To: Placed on the House Consent Calendar

     WHEREAS, The Honorable John Lewis, United States Congressman, courageous civil

rights leader, and American hero, passed away on July 17, 2020. Congressman Lewis was the

husband of the late Lillian Miles and together they had one son, John-Miles Lewis; and

     WHEREAS, John Lewis was born on February 21, 1940, near Troy, Alabama, the third

of ten children born into a poor sharecropper family. As a young man Lewis and his family faced

racism and segregation on a daily basis. He was inspired at a young age to fight for equality and a

public service career after following the Montgomery Bus Boycott and meeting Rosa Parks and

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., before reaching the age of eighteen; and

     WHEREAS, Mr. Lewis graduated from the American Baptist Theological Seminary in

Nashville, and was ordained as a Baptist Minister. He went on to attend Fisk University where he

earned a bachelor’s degree in religion and philosophy. After graduating, he proceeded to embark

on a public service career that changed our nation and began the process, one that continues

today, of living up to the promises made in the Declaration of Independence; and

     WHEREAS, Mr. Lewis began his civil rights activism in Nashville organizing sit-ins at

segregated lunch counters. He was arrested and jailed many times, but eventually succeeded

when all lunch counters in downtown Nashville were desegregated. In 1961, Mr. Lewis was one

of the thirteen original Freedom Riders, a group of courageous young people determined to ride

in integrated buses from Washington D.C., to New Orleans, to fulfill a 1960 United States

Supreme Court decision that declared segregated interstate bus travel to be unconstitutional. For

his efforts with the Freedom Riders, Mr. Lewis was jailed for forty days in the Mississippi State

Penitentiary, and he and his colleagues were beaten in numerous places throughout the South. By

1963, Mr. Lewis had been arrested twenty-four times for his activities in support of equal justice;

and

     WHEREAS, Mr. Lewis was a founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee (SNCC), and in 1963 was chosen to serve as its Chairman, a position he held until

1966. During his tenure, the SNCC opened Freedom Schools and conducted voter registration

efforts in Selma, Alabama where he and other Civil Rights activists, on March 7, 1965, were

brutally beaten on the Edmund Pettus Bridge by Alabama State Troopers in an event that

shocked, horrified and angered the nation and came to be known as “Bloody Sunday.” Mr. Lewis

had his skull fractured and bore scars from this incident for the rest of his life; and

     WHEREAS, From 1966 to 1986, Mr. Lewis would go on to serve in a myriad of public

service positions including Director of the Voter Education Project (VEP), which enrolled four

million minority voters under his guidance. He then proceeded to serve in President Carter’s

administration before he resigned to run for an at-large seat on the Atlanta City Council, an

election he won; and

     WHEREAS, In 1986, Mr. Lewis was elected to serve in the United States House of

Representatives, representing the Atlanta metropolitan area. He was re-elected sixteen times,

serving until his passing on July 17, 2020. He was a respected leader within the Democratic

Party, serving as a Chief Deputy Whip from 1991 to 2003, and as a Senior Chief Deputy Whip

from 2003 to his passing. Throughout his tenure in the United States House of Representatives he

was an eloquent and tireless fighter for human rights across the globe and in support of equality

for all Americans. He was a passionate advocate in support of programs that have provided

opportunities and hope to those Americans living on the margins of society, and to eliminate all

forms of discrimination and inequality in American life; and

     WHEREAS, Congressman Lewis has received many honors in recognition of his service

to our nation. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama

in 2011. Other important awards include the Wallenberg Medal from the University of Michigan,

the Four Freedoms Award, the Profile in Courage Award from the John F. Kennedy Library

Foundation, the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP, the John Heinz Award, the Dole Leadership

Prize from the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics, and the first LBJ Liberty and Justice For All

Award, given by the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation; now, therefore be it

     RESOLVED, That this House of Representatives of the State of Rhode Island hereby

expresses its deepest condolences on the passing of the Honorable United States Congressman

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John Lewis; and be it further

     RESOLVED, That the Secretary of State be and hereby is authorized and directed to

transmit duly certified copies of this resolution to the President of the United States, Donald J.

Trump, Governor Gina M. Raimondo, United States House of Representatives Speaker Nancy

Pelosi, and United States Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

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