Johnson said the application of that strategy is what ultimately led Savannah to end segregation of public accommodations in 1963, a few months ahead of the passage of the Civil Rights Act. “You’ve gotta have people on the inside where the policies and the laws are made, and you’ve gotta have people on the outside, rattling the sabers and threatening, sometimes disruption to get folks attention, so they will pay some heed to what you're talking about,” Johnson said. Johnson calls it an “inside-outside strategy.” Johnson said that approachable style of leadership stuck with him: keeping one foot rooted in the needs of the community, and the other in the political sphere. it was a tremendous opportunity to just soak in what real leadership was like.” It was just like hanging out anywhere else. “And you know how it is when the brothers get together, you have to figure out what's the truth and what’s not true. But when those guys were hanging out in Paschal’s, they were just like anybody else,” Johnson said. “When you hear about them in history, you tend to put a halo on some of them.

He said the vibe at Paschal’s was very down-to-Earth, despite the tall public stature of those who congregated there. Former Savannah Mayor Otis Johnson remembers going to Paschal’s restaurant in Atlanta in the 1960s to rub shoulders with Lewis and other civil rights leaders.Īt the time, Johnson was a master's degree student at Clark Atlanta University, and a neophyte in the movement. “And his commitment to universalism, to the principle that we're all human beings, and our universal humanity is the most important thing that binds us and should guide us, is at the core of my approach to public policy and public life.”Īnd Ossoff isn’t the only one Lewis influenced. “He was my mentor for nearly two decades, he gave me my first job, and helped guide me through my personal and my public life,” Ossoff said. Ossoff said Lewis’ lifelong commitment to advancing civil rights and voting rights for Black Americans and his universalist approach to governance is what he models his own political career after, noting “no one has had a more profound influence on worldview.” More: Georgia senator: 'Recognize the hurt' of Black Savannahians and rename Talmadge Bride He was re-elected to Congress 16 times, only dropping below 70 percent of the vote once. He landed himself a spot on Atlanta City Council in 1981, and in 1986, he won a congressional seat, establishing himself as a representative of his district. that became known as “Bloody Sunday,” Lewis and fellow activist Hosea Williams led over 600 people on a march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where they were tear gassed by police, and Lewis' skull was fractured.Īll that “Good Trouble,” as he famously put it, set him up to be an enduring figure in a changing America. Lewis served as president of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and at 23, he represented the group with a speech at the historic event.

He was the youngest of the 'Big Six,' the leaders of six prominent civil rights organizations who helped put together the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. In college, he organized and participated in sit-ins at segregated Nashville restaurants. His resume includes membership in the original 13 Freedom Riders, activists who fought against the segregated interstate system in the South in 1961. Lewis’ role as a young leader during the fight for civil rights saw him take up the mantle of the elder leadership of the era as they grew older, eventually becoming a congressman. More: How the Black Lives Matter generation remembers John Lewis

“He was a champion of the principles of universal human understanding and compassion, of Gandhian nonviolence and a titan of the civil rights movement, whose personal sacrifices paved the way for passage of the Voting Rights Act.” You could feel his profound sense of empathy and compassion from across the room, and I think that we can still feel it today,” Ossoff said. “Congressman Lewis, radiated strength and kindness and love. “Whenever I am faced with a difficult decision, the first thing upon which I meditate is how he would guide me if I could still pick up the phone and call him like I used to, all the time,” Ossoff said.

John lewis phone number ga