By AUDREY FISCHER
In a powerful and moving lecture held at the Library on Feb. 2, Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) recounted his coming of age in rural Alabama and the civil rights movement during the 1950s and '60s.
A key figure in the movement, Rep. Lewis has chronicled his experiences in the book Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement (cowritten with Michael D'Orso and published by Simon & Schuster). The American Library Association recently named the book "the best adult nonfiction title of 1998."
"I am so pleased to be here in this historic, beautiful place that holds so much information and knowledge," said Rep. Lewis. "If anyone would have told me when I was growing up that I would one day be speaking at the Library of Congress as an author, I would have said he was out of his mind."
This presentation was sponsored by the Humanities and Social Sciences Division and the Center for the Book as part of the center's "Books & Beyond" Series and the Library's celebration of African American History Month.
Born the son of a sharecropper in Troy, Ala., about 50 miles from Montgomery, John Lewis spent his boyhood days caring for the chickens on 110 acres of land his grandfather purchased with $300. "I believed that was my calling, my mission, my sacred obligation," said Rep. Lewis.
But he also felt a higher calling, and he would preach the gospel to the flock. "Some bowed their heads, some shook their heads, but I don't believe any of those chickens ever said ‘Amen.' But they were better listeners than some of my colleagues in Congress, and they were certainly more productive," joked Rep. Lewis.
When he was 10, he tried to get a library card from the local Pike County Public Library, but was refused because of his race. He knew he would be refused, but decided to apply anyway. This was the first formal protest action of his life, and not the last.
In a move that led to his first formal meeting with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Mr. Lewis sought admission to Troy State University in 1957. When his application received no response, he enrolled instead at the American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville, but wrote a letter to King about his plight. King sent him a round-trip ticket to Montgomery, Ala., so that he could meet "the boy from Troy who wants to desegregate Troy State." This was the beginning of their personal and professional relationship that would be cut short by King's assassination in 1968.
Mr. Lewis remained at the theological seminary where he played a leadership role in the Nashville movement — a student-led effort based on the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi that successfully desegregated the city through nonviolent means and became a model for the civil rights movement of the 1960s.
In 1961 he led the Freedom Rides to challenge segregation at interstate bus terminals. In 1963 he became chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which he helped form, and, at 23, was the youngest person to speak publicly at the historic Aug. 28, 1963, march on Washington for jobs and freedom.
As Mr. Lewis traveled through the South, he became increasingly aware of the obstacles that made it impossible for blacks to register to vote. Unfair literacy tests posed such unanswerable questions as "How many bubbles are there in a bar of soap?"
"I doubt any one here at the Library of Congress can answer that one," he said.
While only a small percentage of blacks in the South were registered to vote, he said, "White voter registration was more than 100 percent." Mr. Lewis applied a popular political slogan of the time — "one man, one vote" — to the grassroots movement for a voting rights act, which, after much bloodshed, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law on Aug. 6, 1965. Mr. Lewis suffered a fractured skull at the hands of Alabama state troopers during the March 7, 1965, march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery that would be known as "Bloody Sunday."
"When the American people saw what happened on that day, they reacted with righteous indignation," he recalled. With the passage of the Voting Rights Act, "we witnessed a nonviolent revolution of ideas and values."
Through it all, Mr. Lewis never lost his belief in "building the beloved community" — an all-inclusive community in which no one is left out. The seeds of this idea were sown when John Lewis, as a young boy, was caught in his aunt's tin-roof house in rural Alabama during a severe thunderstorm. His Aunt Seneva told the children to hold hands and walk toward the corner of the house that was rising off of its foundations. The family literally "walked with the wind" to secure the house.
"So are we trying to hold the American house together," said Rep. Lewis. "The wind may blow, the lights may flash and the thunder may roll, but we must never leave the house. We all came on different ships, but we're all in the same boat."
On July 5, 1998, Lewis returned to the Pike County Public Library for a book signing. He was finally given a library card — nearly 50 years after he was first refused.
"We have come a distance, and made progress," he said. "Walking with the Wind is not just my story, but it is the story of all the men and women who put their bodies on the line during a difficult period in our nation's history."
Ms. Fischer is a public affairs specialist in the Public Affairs Office.