Barack Obama's Eulogy for John Lewis Was Perfect
Source: Slate
By JEREMY STAHL
On Thursday, mourners honored civil rights icon and longtime Rep. John Lewis in Atlanta. At his funeral ceremony, the first Black president of the United States, Barack Obama, gave a eulogy that served both to pay tribute to one of the greatest leaders of the American civil rights movement and call for specific action to carry on that legacy. It will likely go down as one of Obama’s greatest speeches, and it is worth watching in full.
In a speech that was almost surprising in its frank invocation of politics, Obama compared the brutal 1965 violence that nearly ended Lewis’ life—police fractured his skull on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama—to the violent suppression of peaceful protests by federal officers today, called the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision to gut the Voting Rights Act and the wave of voter suppression that followed “an attack on what John fought for,” challenged hypocritical congressional leaders who have opposed a renewal of “the law that [Lewis] was wiling to die for” while issuing empty statements calling him a “hero,” called for the end to the disenfranchisement of formerly incarcerated people, called for making Election Day a national holiday, called for statehood for D.C. and Puerto Rico, and called for “eliminating the filibuster, another Jim Crow relic, in order to secure the God-given rights of every American.”
The barnburner of a political speech followed a powerful retelling of some of the highlights of Lewis’ life and career, a narrative that laid the groundwork for Obama’s call to action. It seemed clear that Obama was devastated by the death of a man he called a mentor.
“It is a great honor to be back at Ebenezer Baptist Church in the pulpit of its greatest pastor, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., to pay my respects to perhaps his finest disciple,” Obama said near the start of his remarks, his voice nearly breaking.
Former President Barack Obama speaks during the funeral service of the late Rep. John Lewis at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta on Thursday. Alyssa Pointer—Pool/Getty Images
Read more: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/07/barack-obama-eulogy-for-john-lewis-was-perfect.html
Video at link.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Barack Obama gave a powerful eulogy for Rep. John Lewis at his funeral service.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tasneemnashrulla/obama-john-lewis-eulogy-portland-protests
Posted on July 30, 2020, at 4:18 p.m. ET
?downsize=700%3A%2A&output-quality=auto&output-format=auto
Barack Obama speaks from a lectern while standing above John Lewis's coffin, which is draped in a US flag
Alyssa Pointer / AP
Barack Obama used his eulogy at the funeral for Rep. John Lewis on Thursday to compare President Donald Trump's sending of federal officers to quash protests in Portland, Oregon, to the tactics of George Wallace, the segregationist Alabama governor who sent state troopers to violently break up peaceful civil rights demonstrations in the 1960s.
Lewis, a civil rights icon who died on July 17 at age 80, was nearly beaten to death in Selma by Alabama troopers authorized by Wallace to stop a historic march for voting rights on March 7, 1965, in what came to be known as Bloody Sunday.
Advertisement
Speaking at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Obama also compared the current use of force by police against Black people to the racist actions of Bull Connor, the commissioner of public safety in Birmingham, Alabama, in the 1960s who was known for using fire hoses and police dog attacks against civil rights activists in Alabama.
"Bull Connor may be gone, but today we witness with our own eyes police officers kneeling on the necks of Black Americans," Obama said, referring to the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis.
"George Wallace may be gone, but we can witness our federal government sending agents to use tear gas and batons against peaceful demonstrators," he added.
..............................................................................
