Statue of the late US Rep. John Lewis unveiled in his native Alabama

MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- A statue of the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon, has been unveiled in Alabama's capital city.

The likeness, called Steadfast Stride Toward Justice, sits in the Equal Justice Initiative's Legacy Plaza in Montgomery. It joins statues of Rosa Parks, unveiled in February, and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., unveiled in June, AL.com reported.

Atlanta-based sculptor Basil Watson created all three statues, which stand across from the initiative's Legacy Museum in Montgomery.

“I just think the entire state of Alabama owes John Lewis so much because he pulled us all out of the darkness of Jim Crow and racial segregation,” said the initiative's executive director, Bryan Stevenson. “He created the opportunities that we get to celebrate in so many of our public spaces, from football fields to basketball places. It wouldn’t have been possible without his courage.”

In addition to the statues, the plaza features a brick sculpture memorializing civil rights marchers and a mural by local artist Kevin King.

Lewis was a native of Pike County, Alabama, and is known for leading hundreds across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma on March 7, 1965, a day now known as “Bloody Sunday.”

He was elected to the Atlanta City Council in 1981 and to Congress in 1986, where he served 17 terms in the U.S. House from Georgia’s 5th District. He died in 2020 at age 80.

Former President Barack Obama awarded Lewis the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011.

“Generations from now, when parents teach their children what is meant by courage, the story of John Lewis will come to mind -- an American who knew that change could not wait for some other person or some other time; whose life is a lesson in the fierce urgency of now,” the former president said during the ceremony.