U.S. Postal Service announces stamp honoring late Rep. John Lewis

By Dareh Gregorian, NBC News

The U.S. Postal Service announced Tuesday it would memorialize the late Rep. John Lewis with a new stamp next year.

In its announcement, the Postal Service said the stamp “celebrates the life and legacy” of Lewis.

“Devoted to equality and justice for all Americans, Lewis spent more than 30 years in Congress steadfastly defending and building on key civil rights gains that he had helped achieve in the 1960s. Even in the face of hatred and violence, as well as some 45 arrests, Lewis remained resolute in his commitment to what he liked to call ‘good trouble,'” the Postal Service said.

Lewis, a giant of the civil rights movement who represented Georgia in Congress for decades, died of pancreatic cancer in July 2020. He was 80.

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Lewis credited King and Rosa Parks for motivating him to stand up against segregation and inequality.

“I would ask my mother and my father and my grandparents, my great grandparents, ‘Why?’ And they would say: ‘That’s the way it is. Don’t get in the way. Don’t get in trouble,’” he recalled in a 2015 speech. “The action of Rosa Parks and the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr. inspired me to find a way to get in the way, to get in trouble — good trouble, necessary trouble.”

Read more about Lewis’ work.

Lewis was also honored with a eulogy by President Obama and inspired BLM activists.

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