KU News Release

Civil rights leader, congressman to receive Dole Leadership Prize

Rep. John Lewis

LAWRENCE — Legendary civil rights activist U.S. Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., will receive this year’s Robert J. Dole Leadership Prize from the Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas. Roll Call magazine has called Lewis “a genuine American hero and moral leader who commands widespread respect in the chamber.”

The program takes place at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 21, at the Lied Center. Tickets are required but are free.

“The list of politicians who are also heroes and great men isn’t particularly long,” said Jonathan Earle, interim director of the Dole Institute. “Through his decades-long fight for racial equality and justice, and as a true leader in our federal government, Congressman Lewis represents exactly the type of person Sen. Dole had in mind when he began the institute’s leadership prize.”

Lewis has represented Georgia’s fifth district in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1987. He has garnered respect from leaders in every part of the political spectrum. Sen. John McCain said of Lewis, “I’ve seen courage in action on many occasions. I can’t say I’ve seen anyone possess more of it, and use it for any better purpose and to any greater effect, than John Lewis.” Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi calls Lewis “the conscience of the U.S. Congress.”

Lewis has been at the center of the civil rights movement since the early 1960s, when he became active as a college student in the sit-in movements in Nashville, Tenn. He participated in the Freedom Rides to desegregate the South and became chairman of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee in 1963.

He became a national figure after his prominent role in the civil rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, Ala., when police beat Lewis mercilessly in public with the television cameras rolling. The beatings fractured his skull and left head wounds that are still visible today but never shook his belief in nonviolence as a tool for pursuing justice.

“I thought I was going to die a few times,” Lewis later recalled. “On the Freedom Ride in 1961, when I was beaten at the Greyhound bus station in Montgomery, I thought I was going to die. On March 7, 1965, when I was hit in the head with a night stick by a state trooper at the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, I thought I was going to die. I thought I saw death but nothing can make me question the philosophy of nonviolence.”

Later he served as director of the Voter Education Project, which added more than 4 million minorities to the voting rolls, and ACTION, a federal volunteer agency. He also served on the Atlanta City Council before winning a seat in Congress in 1986.

Since 1991, Lewis has been a leading member in the Democratic caucus. He serves on the House Ways and Means Committee and is the chair of its Subcommittee on Oversight.

Lewis has received numerous awards for his work in civil rights activism and civil service. He has been featured in many books about the civil rights movement and authored the autobiographical “Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement.” Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the Lied Center.

Previous winners of the Dole Leadership Prize include former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, former U.S. Sens. Howard Baker and George McGovern and former Polish President Lech Walesa.

Tickets may be picked up at the box offices of the Lied Center, Murphy Hall or Student Union Activities in the Kansas Union. Tickets may also be ordered online at www.lied.ku.edu or by phone at (785) 864-2787. There is a $5 charge for online and phone orders. Doors will open at 7 p.m.

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