Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) called on the Supreme Court on Tuesday to remember America’s history by “walking in the shoes” of those who gave their lives in pursuit of voting rights, which the court took a swipe at earlier that morning when it struck down a key provision of the Voting Rights Act.
“My message to the members of the United States Supreme Court is: remember, don’t forget, our recent history,” Lewis said in an interview with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell. “Walk in our shoes […] come and walk in the shoes of those three young men that died in Mississippi. Come and walk in the shoes of those of us who walked across that bridge on ‘Bloody Sunday,’ March 7, 1965.”
Mitchell asked Lewis if the congressman thought when the Voting Rights Act was signed into law that a court could someday strike it down. Lewis said he wouldn’t have believed it — and vowed to carry on the fight for voting rights despite the court’s ruling.
“I didn’t think that on that day when President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act that I would live to see five members of the United States Supreme Court undoing what President Johnson did with those pens,” Lewis said. “I have one of the pens that he used to sign that law at my home in Atlanta. And when I get home, I will pick up that pen.”
Watch the interview below:
