Rep. John Lewis Comments on the Decision of the Jury in the Killen Mississippi Murder Trial

Statement

Congressman John Lewis made this statement in response to the conviction of Edgar Ray Killen in a Mississippi courtroom today:

"It is so strange. It is so ironic. It is almost eerie that Edgar Ray Killen was convicted today exactly 41 years to the day that James Chaney, Mickey Schwerner, and Andy Goodman were found missing in Philadelphia, Mississippi. I knew these three young men, these brave and courageous fighters for freedom. They did not die in Vietnam. They did not die in the Middle East. They did not die in Eastern Europe. They did not die in Africa or South America; they died right here in the United States. And they were killed simply for helping Americans exercise their constitutional right to vote.

"They were killed, not just by vicious members of the Ku Klux Klan, but they were also killed by an evil system of tradition and government that perpetuated segregation, racial discrimination, and deliberately and methodically denied African Americans the right to vote. Their murder was a sad and dark hour for the whole Civil Rights Movement, and especially for those of us who participated in the Mississippi Summer project. When we realized that these three young men were missing, it broke our hearts, but it did not destroy our determination to continue the struggle to gain the right to vote.

"For more than a thousand young people who risked their lives in Mississippi that summer, and for the mothers and the families of James Chaney, Mickey Schwerner, and Andy Goodman, maybe, just maybe, what happened today will offer some degree of closure. It took a long time to bring some resolution to this case, but justice is never too late. I hope that this conviction will have a cleansing effect on our nation's dark racial past.

"I also hope that the state of Mississippi and the American people will do more. I hope that we will seek and find appropriate ways to honor the sacrifices of these three young men. I hope that as a nation and as a people we will always remember that the struggle for civil rights in America is littered by the battered and broken bodies of countless men and women who paid the ultimate price for a precious right--the right to vote. We must not take that right for granted. We have a mandate from these three young men who gave their lives for our freedom in the red clay of Mississippi. We must continue the struggle for justice in America and around the world."

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