5 activists on how they’re carrying Rep. John Lewis’s legacy ahead

Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia congressman and icon of the civil rights motion, died Friday on the age of 80.

All through his decades-long profession, Lewis was identified for his activism — from his roots as a Freedom Rider and firebrand organizer of the March on Washington, to the numerous occasions he was arrested, some as a member of the US Home of Representatives. In his time as a lawmaker, he grew to become an advocate for LGBTQ rights, expanded freedoms for immigrants and refugees, and supported gun reform measures. He continued this work in his last weeks — only a month earlier than he died of pancreatic most cancers, he visited Washington, DC’s Black Lives Matter Plaza, one among many locations reflecting the present wave of anti-racism protests sweeping the world.

He was identified for encouraging individuals to grow to be activists themselves, saying they need to not hesitate to get in “good hassle.” And he impressed many to just do that.

Right here, 5 activists mirror on what Lewis’s legacy meant to them, and the way it could also be carried ahead. Their responses, edited for readability and size, are under.

Tanya Washington, professor of legislation at Georgia State College and former director of the John Lewis Fellowship Program

At 21, he was one of many first Freedom Riders; at 23, he was the chairperson of SNCC, and helped set up the March on Washington, and at 25, he was on the Selma protests. I believe it’s empowering for younger individuals to acknowledge that their vitality, their perspective is important. It’s younger individuals who moved the needle within the civil rights motion. They had been faculty college students, highschool college students. Some had been even youthful than that — the children who built-in faculties after Brown v. Board had been little college youngsters. I believe youthful activists will draw from his legacy a way of energy and accountability: Their contribution can start proper now.

Everybody quotes him saying, “Get in good hassle.” I believe what that actually has meant to me is to not be afraid to make selections which can be unpopular. What different individuals would possibly name hassle, by way of a historic lens will probably be referred to as progress. It’s impressed me to take dangers once I’m guided by my ethical compass.

I positively see [his influence] once I have a look at the Black Lives Matter motion, and I see the younger individuals within the streets, risking their lives and their well being to implement democracy, to make it possible for we’ve justice as a part of our felony authorized system, and that we eradicate racism. I see the identical spirit that motivated John Lewis as a youngster to get entangled. He decides whereas he’s in faculty to enroll to be a Freedom Rider, which isn’t going to finish effectively, simply by way of the danger to life and limb that it entails. Nevertheless it was one thing he was prepared to die for. And I’m seeing that very same dedication made by younger individuals who have been protesting in opposition to the problems, racism, and xenophobia which can be all too prevalent in society immediately. I see that very same spirit of youth activism, and that dedication and dedication.

One of many issues that I actually liked about John Lewis is that he understood that equality just isn’t divisible. He wasn’t simply combating for equality and only for Black individuals, however for everybody. Until everybody can take pleasure in equality, equality doesn’t exist. … I hope we’ll proceed to see individuals working throughout intersectionality. It’s not simply Black individuals, it’s trans Black ladies, it’s poor Indigenous males, it’s individuals from the LGBTQ neighborhood. All throughout the spectrum, till all of us are handled equally, none of us are handled equally. When he talked in regards to the “beloved neighborhood,” he meant all people.

He lived a life that set the instance for a way human beings can have an effect. From very humble beginnings, he grew to become an American hero. I’m so honored and humbled to have had an opportunity to work with him and to be impressed by his legacy. And I’ll miss him.

Janai Nelson, affiliate director-counsel of the NAACP Authorized Protection and Academic Fund (LDF)

[Lewis] actually underscored for me the ability and the energy that it takes to do civil rights [work], and actually crystallized the function of Black individuals in shaping this nation on an ongoing foundation, and forcing this nation to stay as much as its beliefs and to ship on its guarantees. It’s really by power that it occurs — it’s by the power of will and stamina and technique, on the half of people that have largely been nonviolent.

There’s a energy and energy in that that’s simply immeasurable, and he embodied that fully. He was the epitome of that energy and energy that would transfer mountains and destroy programs and power political arms, simply by way of his tenacity and resolve and technique. And brilliance — he was completely good.

After I have a look at the faces of protesters on the road immediately, I see John Lewis. I see the Freedom Riders. … After I see younger individuals going up towards police, in army gear, who will wantonly assault them, though they’re solely exercising their constitutional proper of freedom of meeting and freedom of speech, I see the bravery of individuals like John Lewis yet again. He set an instance of what it means to talk reality to energy, to look evil within the face and never blink.

One [way to carry forward his legacy] is to proceed the unfinished enterprise of constructing this democracy by securing and defending the appropriate to vote on an equal foundation for all individuals, and that requires the passage of the Voting Rights Development Act, which might restore the laws that he put his life on the road for (the Voting Rights Act of 1965), and shield the appropriate to vote throughout a interval of historical past when it’s underneath extreme and pernicious assault.

And the opposite coverage space is the safety of protesters: Guaranteeing that the methodology that he used to nice success is one which continues to be among the many instruments and the arsenal of people that need transformative change. If we can’t shield protesters — if we permit legislation enforcement and white supremacists to assault and intervene with peaceable protest — then we haven’t realized something from the historical past of individuals like John Lewis.

It’s simply outstanding to me how loving and upbeat and sort he remained, even towards his worst enemies. … Each American owes a debt to John Lewis for his sacrifice and his lifetime of service. He by no means appeared embittered by the truth that, even at 80, he nonetheless needed to wrestle for the rights that he fought for 55 years in the past. He didn’t throw up his arms. He simply inspired others to maintain up the battle, and stood proper there with them and helped to steer it.

To face these struggles, to nonetheless be so beneficiant of spirit and optimistic, it’s outstanding, and it’s the true marker of a complete particular person, of somebody who’s so self-possessed and is just too sturdy to have their character marred by the exterior frailties of this nation.

Kamau Chege, supervisor of the Washington Census Alliance

In 2013, I graduated highschool, and shortly afterward, [worked as] an affiliate chief [with] United We Dream. That summer season was the massive summer season for pushing the great immigration reform invoice. We did an entire bunch of actions, however close to the autumn, as we’re desirous to escalate, members of Congress had been demonstrating outdoors the Capitol, and Rep. John Lewis was arrested.

A pair weeks earlier than that, I had gone right down to DC, and we had been strategizing how individuals had been going to push [for the bill]. I went to speak to the Congressional Black Caucus, and was capable of catch Rep. Lewis as he was strolling. He was a quick walker! He was operating late to a vote. I used to be explaining the invoice, and requested, “Can we rely on you?” He stated, “You’ll be able to rely on me,” and gave the thumbs up.

I used to be younger in 2013 — I used to be 18 years outdated — and this was someone who was in our historical past and AP Gov lessons, with the PBS Eyes on the Prize sequence. That is how the youthful millennials understood him.

It wasn’t ’til the motion the place he was arrested, and I used to be watching that … from afar, [where I] bought this sense of, ‘That is his life’s work, in some methods: getting arrested for racial justice.’ He’s been doing this since he was my age; he joined SNCC when he was younger.

After information got here down that he had handed, one of many issues I used to be occupied with, and I’ve been occupied with the previous few years — my household has been right here for 20 years, and we’ve been undocumented for 17 — is what sort of nation my dad and mom thought they had been immigrating to.

They had been in all probability making an attempt to return to a rustic the place everybody was assured a dignified life. Jobs and justice. That’s a rustic that John Lewis in all probability didn’t see when he was younger … but it surely’s one which he bought to see the beginnings of by the point I met him, in 2013, within the Home, pushing for and alongside the brand new currents of actions.

[In 2013,] we’d be coaching for civil disobedience. A part of that would come with studying about SNCC, what did they do, what sort of actions did they use, how had been they capable of push issues ahead and construct a motion that lots of people may see themselves in.

You run into a number of John Lewis’s work, and the way he ran SNCC on the time, and that’s nonetheless frequent. There’s nonetheless individuals from SNCC that advise younger organizers now. And that meant that we noticed ourselves as not beginning one thing new, however in a lineage and a convention of younger individuals normally, and younger Black and brown organizers, protesting and pushing to make it possible for we develop up within the type of nation that John Lewis, C.T. Vivian, and the remaining had been shaping.

LaTosha Brown, co-founder of Black Voters Matter Fund

He deeply believed in democracy. There have been American founders who believed in creating this new nation, and so they had some concepts, and explored a philosophy with democracy, however their actions present that they didn’t consider within the fullness of American democracy. They had been the founders of the nation, however not of democracy. They didn’t have the foresight to see John Lewis as a member of Congress, or to even see him as human sufficient to have the ability to vote.

John Lewis is among the forefathers on this nation of true democracy, who actually internalized and believed within the growth of the vote, not only for Black individuals however for all residents. He believed in equality for all individuals. The forefathers didn’t consider that. He believed that.

I believe he had an acute consciousness of the work of younger individuals, and of when younger individuals are [being] marginalized within the motion. He offered a number of grace and area for younger individuals, which is why one of many final issues he did was exit to [Washington, DC’s] Black Lives Matter Plaza. That was a message of, ‘I’m in solidarity with you.’ He was capable of bridge this political world and this activist world, and perceive the evolution of how actions happen.

The final time I noticed him was this 12 months within the Selma-Montgomery march [at the Edmund Pettus Bridge]. I didn’t assume he was going to return this 12 months, due to his most cancers. … As we get to the highest of the bridge, I’m standing there, the gang stops. … He walks as much as the gang, like Moses parting the ocean. I’m instantly in entrance of him. I knew that was his final speech. I don’t know the way I knew, however I knew.

As an activist, the weeks previous to that had been actually robust. … I used to be actually feeling overwhelmed. I’m this man who’s actually battling most cancers, to really have the braveness, to really get the energy, and you may inform he was weak. He speaks to us, and it was simply what I wanted to really feel affirmed. Even in that second, I knew that I couldn’t ever cease this work. There’s a track, “Candy Honey within the Rock:” “We who consider in freedom can’t relaxation till it comes.”

Right here’s this 80-year-old man who’s in Congress, who may actually simply go sit at residence and do what he desires and simply be liked. He knew the significance of that second, however he additionally knew the significance of that work. I felt that I, together with hundreds of thousands of others, had been knighted. I felt affirmed and knighted in that second, that our work was mandatory.

I believe it’s not adequate to return to the place from which we got here. We’re in a relay. We’ve bought to take it ahead. There’s a fragility [to] American democracy. … Whenever you ever have your residents in a spot the place they will totally take part, totally interact, that’s the place you construct patriotism. You don’t construct patriotism by forcing individuals to acknowledge a flag that has been a logo of hatred and racism. You construct patriotism by creating the area for Americans to have interaction, to be affirmed, and exhibit their God-given company.

Raquel Willis, director of communications of Ms. Basis for Ladies; founding father of Black Trans Circles

I met the congressman in 2016. He met with a gaggle of organizers in Atlanta who had been a part of the Black Lives Matter motion. It was a strong expertise. He talked about his experiences and actually gave us encouragement across the activism and the organizing work that we had been already doing.

His lifelong dedication to liberation work is inspiring, I believe significantly at the start of his organizing profession. It’s essential to grasp that, it doesn’t matter what age you might be, you may get into the battle, and that is actually, prefer it was for him, a lifelong dedication. So, we are able to’t anticipate there to be fast, flash-in-the-pan fixes for these programs of oppression. We now have to be invested sooner or later.

The motion that’s occurring now could be simply the continuation of Black liberation work that has occurred for hundreds of years. We prefer to have this concept that these actions are fully separate, however actually, a number of what has fueled [activists today] has come from the actions earlier than. There’s a direct line to the civil rights motion from the place we are actually within the motion for Black lives.

Notably on this election 12 months, I believe his work round strengthening of us’ entry to electoral energy is essential, however I additionally assume that generally what’s extra essential is the organizing that occurs on the bottom amongst the individuals, simply getting individuals concerned, past voting. There’s so many various ways in which individuals can remodel society, and I believe we regularly solely, or largely, deal with electoral energy.

In terms of organizing, you possibly can set up round so many various issues, that what’s essential is stretching the muscle. I consider organizing as a artistic endeavor, so we’ve to be occupied with ways in which we are able to increase entry in no matter cases or areas that we’re in.

I believe it’s essential when any determine dies that we maintain the glory that we’ve for them, however that we maintain the arduous critiques that we might have about their selections or a few of their rhetoric whereas they had been right here. We do a disservice in making an attempt to color anybody as excellent. I believe we are able to maintain difficult emotions about figures with out throwing out their legacy.

We should always actually be pleased about the strides {that a} determine just like the congressman made, and we are able to additionally take into consideration the ways in which we are able to maintain these critiques, honor these critiques and make a dedication to develop in our personal work and be higher figures for generations to return. I believe a number of what we are able to study from any determine’s life is there’s a lot extra work to do, and there’s so many extra methods to open doorways for generations to return.

I hope that people will proceed to be invested within the organizers who’re doing work on the bottom immediately. We now have a society that loves to have a look at our historical past of organizing with rose-colored glasses. People discuss in regards to the “civil rights motion” now, however on the time [those activists] had been very maligned, and there wasn’t a real help for the work that they had been doing, and that also continues immediately. I believe we’ve to be reflective on the ways in which we might critique present actions with out actually participating with what they’re saying or what they’re combating for.

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