John Lewis, a Founding Father
Bloody Sunday, 1965 – image furnished by U.S. Department of Justice - Public Domain
Funny how the times I’ve lived through have become history. When you live long enough, I suppose that will happen.
A few weeks ago The Washington Post included a book review that caught my attention. The review, John Lewis finally gets a full biography by Brandon Tensley, wasn’t altogether kind to the biographer’s work, though Tensley believes John Lewis, the subject, is a historical figure. True that.
In photos from ‘65, Lewis is one more young Black looking into the camera. Arriving at the present day, he’s found his place among America’s pantheon. I’d have loved to hear that story.
Tensley feels Raymond Arsenault’s ‘John Lewis: In Search of the Beloved Community’ was better on the details than what explained John Lewis, the man. I know only the recent stories about Lewis since his death in 2020.-But what came together in my mind was something entirely different.
Martin Luther King was one of the county’s most recent founding fathers. Consider: what might have come of a violent war by blacks on whites and what would have surely followed from it? Oh, let’s say, maybe something like the Israeli-Hamas war?
Palestinians are rightfully angry at their mistreatment by Israeli actions. Israelis are enraged by terrorist deaths at the hands of Hamas. Hamas accomplished what they’d set out to do, with the bloody deed funded by fundamentalists in Iran—which resolved nothing more than to confirm how to prolong the conflict. And bombing Gaza into a concrete desert will settle things?
So what might our country have suffered if the black civil rights demonstrators picked up arms instead? A handful did, but they did not lead their people to the promised land—Martin, John and company did that—and they brought the rest of the country with them. When the stronger power doesn’t have the wisdom and fortitude to lead their people ‘in the direction of justice’ sometimes they are taught by those they oppress. From A Winter Chair on Medium.
In present day Israel, their leaders refuse to recognize the tragedy they are inflicting on the Palestinians is much the same as their own sad history.