John Lewis

John Lewis

Politician

John Lewis was a prominent civil rights leader and U.S. Congressman known for his advocacy for justice and nonviolent protest.

Thinking People President Kings America Believe
Born
February 21, 1940
Quotes
120
Rank
#2083

Quote collection

John Lewis quotes (page 4 of 6)

120 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.

John Lewis Politician
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"When I was growing up in rural Alabama, as a young child, about 50 miles from Montgomery, and we would visit the little town of Troy, or visit Montgomery or Tuskegee, I would see the signs that said, "WHITE MEN - COLORED MEN," "WHITE WOMEN - COLORED WOMEN."And I would come home and say to my mother and father and my grandparents, "Why?" "Why this?" "Why that?" And they would just tell me, "That's just the way it is! Don't get in the way. Don't cause trouble.""

Mother Children Growing Up
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John Lewis Politician
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"I think [James Comey] should take a hard look at what he has done. And I think it would not be a bad thing for the American people if he did step down."

Thinking People Looks
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John Lewis Politician
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"I think right now, the focus has got to be on how we hold [Donald] Trump accountable."

Thinking Focus Trump
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John Lewis Politician
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"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"

Kings Mean College
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John Lewis Politician
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"As a young child, it became crystal clear to me that there were certain rights and privileges that other people had that my mother, my father, my grandparents, my great grandparents didn't have - that it was an ongoing struggle to realize the dream of the 14th and 15th Amendment."

Mother Dream Children
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John Lewis Politician
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"I was so inspired by Dr. King that in 1956 with 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! I never went back to that public library until July 5th, 1998, by this time I'm in the Congress, for a book signing of my book "Walking with the Wind""

Cousin Brother Kings
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John Lewis Politician
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"People should organize people to just turn up and participate in the democratic process. Knock on doors. They may not be old enough to register to vote, but they can urge their teachers, their parents, their grandparents, their mothers, their fathers, and others to get out and vote."

Mother Teacher Father
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John Lewis Politician
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"The advent of the civil rights movement during the 50s and 60s made it very plain crystal clear to me that we had an obligation to do what we could to make real the Constitution of the United States of America."

Real Civil Rights Constitution
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John Lewis Politician
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"In the past the great majority of minority voters, in Ohio and other places that means African American voters, cast a large percentage of their votes during the early voting process."

Mean Past Ohio
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John Lewis Politician
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"Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse."

Hatred Political Sowing
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John Lewis Politician
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"The events in Prague, together with the Berlin blockade, convinced the European recipients of American economic assistance that they needed military protection as well: that led them to request the creation of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which committed the United States for the first time ever to the peacetime defense of Western Europe."

Military Europe Organization
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John Lewis Politician
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"Do we do away with protecting of the American people with pre - to make sure that if you have an illness you can get insurance? Do we make sure that young people stay on their parents' health insurance? Do we make sure that there are no caps if you're dealing with cancer and you deal with preexisting conditions? It goes without saying that those patient protections have got to stay in place."

Cancer People Parent
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John Lewis Politician
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"Right now, what my job is - pardon me? Those are just words. Right now, what my - my job is right now going beyond media conflicts and words is to say that Donald Trump, among other things, told the American people he would not cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and right now Republicans in the House and Senate are doing just that."

Jobs Cutting Media
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John Lewis Politician
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"I think [Donald Trump] is going to be inaugurated this week. I have great concerns, and apparently Republicans do as well, and there's going to be an investigation about the role that Russian hacking played in getting him elected."

Thinking Roles Hacking
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John Lewis Politician
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"There are hundreds and thousands of young Americans who cannot or will not receive an education, because in order to get an education, you have to spend money. Students come out of college and universities with unbelievable debt. It's not right, it's not fair, and it's not just, in a society such as ours. And those dollars are not going to the teachers."

Teacher College Order
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"If we must grind up human flesh and bones in the industrial machine that we call modern America, then, before God, I assert that those who consume the coal and you and I who benefit from that service, because we live in comfort, we owe protection to those men first and we owe security for their families if they die."

Men Voice America
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John Lewis Politician
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"I don't have any extraordinary gifts. I'm just an average Joe who grew up very poor in rural Alabama."

Average Joe Alabama Poor
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