After Barack Obama won the presidency in 2008, Lewis stated that "When we were organizing voter-registration drives, going on the Freedom Rides, sitting in, coming here to Washington for the first time, getting arrested, going to jail, being beaten, I never thought — I never dreamed — of the possibility that an African American would one day be elected president of the United States.". He was the Republican nominee for the 2008 presidential election, before his loss to Barack Obama. The youngest,[41] he was scheduled as the fourth to speak, ahead of the final speaker, Dr. Martin Luther King. [152] The third volume was announced as the recipient of the 2017 Printz Award for excellence in young-adult literature, the Coretta Scott King Award, the YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction, the 2016 National Book Award in Young People's Literature,[153] and the Sibert Medal at the American Library Association's annual Midwinter Meeting in January 2017. [32][33], Lewis wrote in 2015 that he had known the young activists Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman from New York. On March 7, 1965 – a day that would become known as "Bloody Sunday" – Lewis and fellow activist Hosea Williams led over 600 marchers across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. The current President Donald Trump did not attend the service. McCain said he was "saddened" by the criticism from "a man I've always admired," and called on Obama to repudiate Lewis's statement.

He was of Pisces sun sign. [174], House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that Lewis would lie in state in the United States Capitol Rotunda on July 27 and 28, with a public viewing and procession through Washington, D.C.[175] He is the first African-American lawmaker to be so honored in the Rotunda; in October 2019 his colleague, representative Elijah Cummings, lay in state in the Capitol Statuary Hall. The National Museum of African American History and Culture, located adjacent to the Washington Memorial, held its opening ceremony on September 25, 2016. [62] The race was said to have "badly strained relations in Atlanta's black community" as many Black leaders had supported Bond over Lewis. Lewis finished in second place with 35%.

John Hancock was an 18th century U.S. merchant who was president of the Continental Congress and the first person to sign the Declaration of Independence. "[109], In 2010, Lewis was awarded the First LBJ Liberty and Justice for All Award, given to him by the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation,[191] and the next year, Lewis was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. [147] Book One also became the first graphic novel to win a Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, receiving a "Special Recognition" bust in 2014. [193] Also in 2016, Lewis and fellow Selma marcher Frederick Reese accepted Congressional Gold Medals which were bestowed to the "foot soldiers" of the Selma marchers.

[8][9][10] Lewis had relatives who lived in northern cities, and he learned from them that in the North schools, buses, and businesses were integrated. Together, they had one son, named John-Miles Lewis. [6][5] He earned a bachelor's degree in religion and philosophy from Fisk University, also a historically black college, where he was a member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity. "Lewis, 6 other lawmakers arrested in embassy protest": Herbowy, Greg (Fall 2014). [198], Lewis gave numerous commencement addresses, including at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in 2014,[199] Bates College (in Lewiston, Maine) in 2016,[200] Bard College and Bank Street College of Education in 2017, and Harvard University in 2018.