When you grow up in the Black Baptist Church, you learn to appreciate a good funeral,

one that strikes the right balance between celebrating a life well-lived

and mourning a life lost. The homegoing service for civil rights icon John Lewis, which was held

on July 30, 2020 at historic Ebeneza Baptist Church in Atlanta was a good funeral.

The speakers extolled Lewis's virtues as a person.

They honored his civil rights sacrifices and they celebrated his political accomplishments.

I was watching the service on TV, enjoying it when Bill Clinton walked up to the pulpit.

The former president was halfway through a warm, folksy tribute when he attacked another civil rights icon, Kwame Ture, better known by his

birth name, Stokely Carmichael. Touré was Lewis's successor as the chairperson of the student non-violent

coordinated committee. Born in Trinidad and raised in the Bronx, he introduced the nation

to black power during James Meredith's 1966 March Against Fear. Clinton's language was more

subtle than savage, but the attack was still severe.

This is what he said.

There were two or three years there where the movement went a little bit too far towards Stokely,

but in the end, John Lewis prevailed.

A little too far towards Stokely?

Really?

What Clinton is actually taking issue with is Negroes with guns.

But what he fails to realize is that armed self-defense, both as a philosophy and a practice,

coexisted alongside non-violence throughout the civil rights era. And what's more, in many instances, armed self-defense wasn't even an option.

It was necessary for movement activists and for the movement itself to survive.

In an interview for the Eyes on the Prize documentary series, Toray reflected on the

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