Bill Text: IL HR0807 | 2023-2024 | 103rd General Assembly | Introduced

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Bill Title: Declares February 21, 2024 as John Lewis Day in the State of Illinois to honor the life and legacy of American hero and civil rights leader John Robert Lewis.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 26-1)

Status: (Passed) 2024-05-25 - Resolution Adopted [HR0807 Detail]

Download: Illinois-2023-HR0807-Introduced.html

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HOUSE RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, John Robert Lewis was born to Willie Mae (Carter)
and Eddie Lewis near Troy, Alabama on February 21, 1940; as a
child, he was affectionately known as "Preacher" and insisted
on attending school daily, defying his parents' instructions
to work the family farm, establishing his lifelong commitment
to education and enlightenment; and
WHEREAS, As a high school student, John Lewis intensely
followed the progress of the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955
and 1956; inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., he preached
his first public sermon, entitled "A Praying Mother", at
Macedonia Baptist Church in Troy, Alabama on February 16,
1956; later that year, he joined the NAACP; and
WHEREAS, While a student at the American Baptist
Theological Seminary in Nashville, Tennessee, John Lewis was a
founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee (SNCC), organizing sit-ins at segregated lunch
counters and pushing Nashville to become the first major city
in the South to begin the desegregation of public facilities;
after graduating in 1961, he was subsequently ordained as a
Baptist minister; and
WHEREAS, In 1961, John Lewis became one of the 13 original

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Freedom Riders, challenging segregated interstate travel
throughout the South; two years later, at just 23 years old, he
helped organize the 1963 March on Washington, where he
witnessed Dr. King deliver his famous "I Have a Dream" speech;
that same year, as chair of the SNCC, he proceeded to move to
Atlanta, Georgia; and
WHEREAS, John Lewis led demonstrations against racially
segregated hotels, restrooms, swimming pools, and public
parks, for which he was brutally beaten, left unconscious in
his own blood, and arrested 40 times, spending countless
nights in county jails and 37 days in Parchman Penitentiary;
and
WHEREAS, On March 7, 1965, on what would become known as
Bloody Sunday, John Lewis led 600 peaceful demonstrators who
were demanding their right to vote while marching across the
Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama; he and demonstrators
were met with violence and police brutality, and he suffered a
fractured skull; and
WHEREAS, After televised images of the Bloody Sunday
violence in Selma shocked the conscience of the United States,
President Lyndon B. Johnson called for equal voting rights
legislation before a joint session of Congress, which evolved
into his signing of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (52 U.S.C.

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10301 et seq.) on August 6, 1965; and
WHEREAS, John Lewis married Lillian Miles on December 21,
1968, and she was his best friend, closest ally, and most
steadfast supporter until her death on December 31, 2012; and
WHEREAS, In 1970, John Lewis became director of the Voter
Education Project, which added nearly 4,000,000 minority
voters to the voter rolls, changing the political landscape of
the United States forever; and
WHEREAS, In 1977, John Lewis was appointed by President
Jimmy Carter to direct more than 250,000 volunteers of ACTION,
which was then a federal volunteer agency; and
WHEREAS, In 1981, John Lewis won elected office for the
first time as an at-large councilman on the Atlanta City
Council, where he was a powerful advocate for ethics and
neighborhood preservation; and
WHEREAS, In 1982, John Lewis worked with the American
Jewish Committee to found the Atlanta Black-Jewish Coalition,
part of his decades-long friendship and alliance with the
Jewish community of Georgia, which later led to the
establishment of the Congressional Black-Jewish caucus; and

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WHEREAS, In 1986, John Lewis became the second African
American to represent Georgia in the United States Congress
since Reconstruction, ultimately serving in Congress for over
three decades; during his tenure, he fought for the passage of
the Civil Rights Act of 1991 (Public Law 102-166; 105 Stat.
1071), which was signed into law by President George H.W.
Bush, secured authorization for construction of the National
Museum of African American History and Culture on the National
Mall in Washington, D.C. in 2003, and introduced the Emmett
Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act of 2007 (28 U.S.C. 509
note; Public Law 110-344) to investigate unsolved civil rights
crimes, which was signed into law by President George W. Bush
in 2008; and
WHEREAS, John Lewis was the recipient of a number of
accolades, including being awarded the John F. Kennedy Library
Foundation Profile in Courage Award for his extraordinary
courage, leadership, and commitment to civil rights in 2001
and receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest
civilian honor in the United States, by President Barack Obama
in 2011; and
WHEREAS, On July 17, 2020, John Lewis passed away,
devastating his family, his staff, the City of Atlanta, the
State of Georgia, and the people of the United States, who
united to honor his monumental legacy of hard work and

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self-sacrifice in the pursuit of liberty and justice for all;
and
WHEREAS, John Lewis was known as the "conscience of the
Congress" for his relentless pursuit of justice, his
unflinching commitment to building a society without poverty,
racism, or violence, and his willingness to make what he
called "good trouble, necessary trouble" to confront acts of
injustice; therefore, be it