; and (E) imprisoned several times and spent a month in the Mississippi State Penitentiary. (6) Lewis was a founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and was elected its chair in 1963, serving until 1966. (7) Lewis was the youngest of the Big Six leaders to organize the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and spoke to the crowd of over 200,000 from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. (8) During Lewis’s tenure as chair, the SNCC organized the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer campaign to register Black voters. (9) Lewis and fellow activist Hosea Williams led over 600 marchers over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, on March 7, 1965. The marchers were tear gassed and beaten by the Alabama State Police. Lewis had his skull fractured by an Alabama State trooper’s nightstick. The day became known as Bloody Sunday and inspired nationwide support leading to the enactment of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. (10) Between 1960 and 1966, Lewis was arrested 40 times as a nonviolent protestor for equal justice. (11) Lewis became the director of the Voter Education Project in 1970, which added millions of minority voters to the rolls during his tenure. (12) President Jimmy Carter appointed Lewis to direct ACTION, the Federal agency overseeing more than 250,000 volunteers, in 1977. (13) Lewis was first elected to the House of Representatives in 1986, representing Georgia’s 5th Congressional District. (14) During his 17 terms in the House of Representatives, Lewis became known as the Conscience of the Congress, and was a stalwart champion for equality and justice. (15) Among the numerous honors and awards bestowed on him, Lewis received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama in 2010. (16) Lewis passed away on July 17, 2020, at the age of 80 and lay in state in the United States Capitol Rotunda. (17) Lewis advised: Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a