It is a great honor to be back in Ebenezer Baptist Church in the pulpit of its greatest

pastor at Martin Luther King Jr. to pay my respects to perhaps his finest disciple.

Today, a final celebration of life for late civil rights icon and Georgia

Congressman John Lewis. It was held at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta,

the church once led by the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. The life of John Lewis

was in so many ways, exception. It vindicated the faith in our founding redeemed that faith.

At most American of ideas, the idea that any of us ordinary people without rank or well or title

or fame can somehow point out the imperfections of this nation and come together and challenge

the status quo and decide that it is in our power to remake this country that we love

until it more closely aligns with our highest ideals.

After the funeral, the Congressman was laid to rest at Atlanta's south view cemetery.

He was 80 years old, but decades earlier, John Lewis's life was almost cut short.

On March 7, 1965, a group of protesters gathered at the base of the Edmund Pettis Bridge in

Selma, Alabama, calling for voting rights. 25-year-old John Lewis led the way. It was the first

in a series of planned marches from Selma to Montgomery. We intend to march to Montgomery

to put Zinc St. Gives to the Governor of the Westie Wattles. But before they could get very far,

state troopers attacked the protesters with horses,

billi clubs, and tear gas.

John Lewis was barely beaten. His skull fractured. Dozens of other people were injured.

That day became known as Bloody Sunday.

And images of the violence broadcast nationwide put pressure on Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act.

President Lyndon Johnson made this address to Congress days later.

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