House honors Lewis with emotional moment of silence
WASHINGTON — The House on Monday stood for an emotional moment of silence for Georgia Rep. John Lewis, the civil rights icon who died last week from pancreatic cancer.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi gaveled the House to order, calling on “all who loved John Lewis, wherever you are, rise in a moment of silence in remembrance of the conscience of the Congress.”
Several people on the dais wept as the House stood in silence, heads bowed. When Pelosi tried to move on, those gathered interrupted with sustained applause.
“Our hero, our colleague, our brother, our friend received and answered his final summons from God almighty,” said Rep. Sanford Bishop, the dean of the Georgia delegation.
Lewis,
80,
died
Friday, several months after he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. The son of sharecroppers, Lewis survived a brutal police beating during a 1965 civil rights march in Selma, Alabama. He represented Georgia in the House since 1987, and was known for his kindness and humility.
“Our nation has indeed lost a giant,” Rep. Tom Graves, R-Ga., said.
Earlier, Pelosi recounted their last conversation the day before he died.
“It was a sad one,” Pelosi said of their conversation Thursday. “We never talked about his dying until that day.”
She recalled on “CBS This Morning“how the civil rights icon also threw his clout to women’s rights, LGBTQ rights and other causes.
In Georgia, Democrats selected state Sen. Nikema Williams, chair of the state party, to replace Lewis on the ballot in November.
Williams, 41, was the overwhelming choice Monday from a list of five finalists as the executive committee of the Democratic Party of Georgia works to quickly fill the spot in accordance with state law. She is nearly assured of winning in November in the heavily Democratic 5th Congressional district in the Atlanta
area.
It was not yet clear whether Lewis’ casket would lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda.