The recently deceased congressman John Lewis has been a public light to the United States for over fifty years. Nicknamed “the conscience of Congress,” he courageously campaigned for civil rights since a college student in Nashville. The author Jon Meacham, surely one of America’s greatest biographers, writes this history of Lewis’ doings in the 1960s. With extreme acuity, gravity, and imagery, he captures what the civil rights movement resembled on the inside. In so doing, he memorializes Lewis in a way that proudly continues Lewis’ unique legacy.
I can compare reading the early chapters of this book to only one life experience – a tour of the Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee. I was emotionally overwhelmed and captivated by the national struggle to love all races. Meacham’s research and writing so excels that he makes us see the world through Lewis’ eyes. And of course, Lewis’ vision of the world, captured in Dr. King’s phrase “the beloved community,” was and is one that ought to be held onto.
Lewis and others had to endure much to receive their just place in American culture. Regardless of one’s politics, ethnicity, or nationality, this story needs to be retold again and again. Lewis’ particular tale is one of courage, suffering, and eventual triumph. He famously even had his skull cracked by police in Selma, Alabama, as a testimony that black lives count for something. A photograph of him seeing recent Black Lives Matter protests precedes an afterword in the book by Lewis himself.
The main weakness of this book lies in its brevity. It only recounts about a decade of drama in Lewis’ life. I am left wanting to know this great human more. I am left wanting to learn about how he implemented his vision in one of the most difficult of all places – the United States Congress. I am left wanting to hear about his gentility as he transformed from a civil-rights soldier to dignified leader, much in the way that Washington, Grant, and Eisenhower have. Lewis’ greatness is not restricted to reactions to his skin color in the 1960s American South; it spans to his universal vision for the world. Meacham leaves us with an epilogue that describes such – again, I want more.
In an age of partisanship and vacuous national leadership, I hope that many read this work. It’s not inspiring. It’s tragic and sad, even disheartening. How can fellow human beings treat each other so poorly? This work corrects such prejudices and expresses deep determination to fight for what’s right and good and, dare I say, holy in this world. In the process of reading, it made me examine my own conscience and place in this world. Like all good expressions of the human spirit, it leaves me just wanting more.
His Truth is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope
By Jon Meacham
Copyright (c) 2020
Random House
ISBN13 9781984855022
Page Count: 354
Genre: Biography, American History
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