“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.”

American civil rights activist and statesman

John Robert Lewis was an American civil rights activist and statesman. He served in the United States House of Representatives for Georgia's 5th congressional district from 1987 until his death in 2020. Lewis was a long-serving member of Congress and a leading figure in the American civil rights movement. His public life combined activism and elected office, and his name is closely tied to the struggle for civil rights in the United States.