The Funeral For U.S. Rep. John Conyers Is Set For Monday In Detroit; Bill Clinton To Attend
Former U.S. Representative John Conyers’ funeral will be Monday, November 4, at 11 a.m. at Detroit’s Greater Grace Temple, his wife Monica Conyers confirmed.
Monica Conyers said several elected officials will be in attendance, including former President Bill Clinton. “John Conyers was a champion for justice & equality who spent over 50 years in Congress fighting for the people of Detroit & beyond — including by co-sponsoring the Voting Rights Act, taking a role in the creation of Medicare & defending the Constitution on the Judiciary Committee,” Clinton tweeted Monday.
Rep. Conyers’ funeral will be held at Detroit’s Greater Grace Temple located at 23500 W. Seven Mile in Detroit.
Conyers will lie in state from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday at The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, the museum said. The schedule still is subject to change.
Conyers, was a Korean War veteran who was the longest serving African-American member of Congress in U.S. history. He passed at the age of 90. The Detroit Democrat, who served 53 years in the U.S. House of Representatives, built a reputation as a champion of civil rights.
First elected in 1964, Conyers introduced the first bill to create a federal holiday honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — an effort that languished for years until President Ronald Reagan signed it into law in 1983. Mr. Conyers first offered the bill four days after King was assassinated in Memphis in 1968.