John Lewis

Currently, he is the last remaining speaker from the march. Lewis represented SNCC, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and at 23 was the youngest speaker that day. Read Less

McCain said he was "saddened" by the criticism from "a man I’ve always admired", and called on Obama to repudiate Lewis’s statement. Obama responded to the statement, saying that he "does not believe that John McCain or his policy criticism is in any way comparable to George Wallace or his segregationist policies.” Lewis later issued a follow-up statement clarifying that the he had not compared McCain and Palin to Wallace himself, but rather that his earlier statement was a "reminder to all Americans that toxic language can lead to destructive behavior." The comparison also evokes a comparison to the history of Wallace's politics, who began his career as a moderate. When he lost his first bid as governor to John Patterson, he said he would never be "outniggered" again and consciously determined to use the politics of race to win the seat the next time he ran. John Lewis lived through this history, realizing that the hostility of Wallace's words created a climate and an environment that gave license to unchecked violence against African American communities. This is the history he was calling upon when he offered his original statement, warning against using toxic language merely for the sake of politics that can end in violence against other human beings Read Less