John Lewis
John Lewis
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth21 February 1940
CountryUnited States of America
privilege care health-care
We will stand up for what is right, for what is fair and what is just. Health care is a right and not a privilege.
falling-in-love race gender
Races don't fall in love, genders don't fall in love: Individuals fall in love. We all should be free to marry the person that we love.
rights movement saws
The civil rights movement was based on faith. Many of us who were participants in this movement saw our involvement as an extension of our faith. We saw ourselves doing the work of the Almighty. Segregation and racial discrimination were not in keeping with our faith, so we had to do something.
government states duty
The government, both state and federal, has a duty to be reasonable and accommodating.
optimistic thinking hopeful
I think all Americans should be hopeful, and try to be optimistic.
kings distance beloved-community
We have come a long way in America because of Martin Luther King, Jr. He led a disciplined, nonviolent revolution under the rule of law, a revolution of values, a revolution of ideas. We've come a long way, but we still have a distance to go before all of our citizens embrace the idea of a truly interracial democracy, what I like to call the Beloved Community, a nation at peace with itself.
kings mean college
When I was 15 years old in the tenth grade, I heard Martin Luther King, Jr. Three years later, when I was 18, I met Dr. King and we became friends. Two years after that I became very involved in the civil rights movement. I was in college at the time. As I got more and more involved, I saw politics as a means of bringing about change
war half cold
George Kennan and Paul Nitze were the Adams and Jefferson of the Cold War. They were there for the beginning, they witnessed its course over almost half a century, and they argued with each other constantly while it was going on. But they maintained throughout a remarkable friendship, demonstrating-as few others in our time have-that it is possible to differ with civility. Nicholas Thompson's is a fine account of that relationship, carefully researched, beautifully written, and evocatively suggestive of how much we have lost because such civility has become so rare.
vision starting hopes-and-fears
It is worth starting with visions, though, because they establish hopes and fears. History then determines which prevail.
confined four great message morning sermon sunday walls
It was not enough to come and listen to a great sermon or message every Sunday morning and be confined to those four walls and those four corners. You had to get out and do something.
beyond black create elected family gone officials passing white
Now we have black and white elected officials working together. Today, we have gone beyond just passing laws. Now we have to create a sense that we are one community, one family. Really, we are the American family.
became bringing change civil college heard involved king luther martin means met politics rights saw tenth three time
When I was 15 years old and in the tenth grade, I heard of Martin Luther King, Jr. Three years later, when I was 18, I met Dr. King and we became friends. Two years after that I became very involved in the civil rights movement. I was in college at that time. As I got more and more involved, I saw politics as a means of bringing about change.
believe hard
If you're not hopeful and optimistic, then you just give up. You have to take the long hard look and just believe that if you're consistent, you will succeed.
brothers check cousins inspired librarian public sisters trying whites
I was so inspired by Dr. King that in 1956, with some of my brothers and sisters and first cousins - I was only 16 years old - we went down to the public library trying to check out some books, and we were told by the librarian that the library was for whites only and not for colors. It was a public library.