On March 4, 1961, two buses left Washington headed south. A group of activists known as the Freedom Riders were on board, challenging Jim Crow laws that enforced racial segregation in interstate travel.

The annual Congressional Civil Rights Pilgrimage that took place last Friday, 60 years after that act of nonviolent civil disobedience, commemorated the anniversary and paid tribute to the pilgrimage’s board chairman emeritus, the late Congressman John Lewis.

From May into September 1961, more than 60 Freedom Rides took place, during which more than 400 young Blacks and whites traveled shoulder to shoulder, challenging the Jim Crow transportation laws that a U.S. Supreme Court ruling had struck down but cities across the South were ignoring.

After months of nonviolent civil disobedience by the riders, hundreds of arrests and several violent attacks by those opposing them, the racist system finally fell after the federal Interstate Commerce Commission officially outlawed segregation on interstate mass transit.

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The actions of that generation of civil rights activists paved the way for the young leaders now engaged in efforts to advance racial equity and social justice.

Michael Collins, Lewis’ former chief of staff, kicked off last week’s pilgrimage, which was held virtually because of the ongoing pandemic. In a typical year, the pilgrimage of congressional leaders and others would visit multiple sites in Alabama, culminating in a trip across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, where the infamous “Bloody Sunday” attack on voting rights activists by police and state troopers took place in 1965. Lewis was seriously injured in the attack, which ultimately led to passage of the federal Voting Rights Act.

Collins accompanied Lewis during the congressman’s final pilgrimage in 2020. “Little did we know it would be the last time Congressman Lewis would witness the crossing of the Edmund Pettus Bridge,” Collins said. “By sharing his experiences and those of others, he hoped everyone would return home and change the circumstances of others.”

Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin. (Nik Layman / Alabama NewsCenter)

During this year’s virtual pilgrimage, journalist Jonathan Capehart interviewed Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin and Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed, who are part of a new wave of young Black elected leaders in the state.

“As a country, we’ve made some progress, and I think as a country, we have a lot of progress to make,” said Woodfin. “As mayors we have a pivotal role to play, particularly as Black men who have had life experiences and bring our life experiences to the mayor’s office. There is much reform to do. We have to lead the conversation, not just react to it.”

“As mayors what we take away from the history are the lessons, but also some of the things that are still yet to be done,” said Reed. “In this day and age with the Black Lives Matter movement really pushing elected officials – pushing policy in a way I don’t think we’ve seen in several generations – it is up to us as mayors to really hear their complaints, hear their concerns and turn that into actions.”

Lewis was a prominent civil rights figure well before Bloody Sunday, working with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and others. In 1963, he was among the leaders of the March on Washington. But before that, he was a 21-year-old seminary student who left school to become a Freedom Rider.

Freedom Riders, from left, John Lewis, Charles Butler, Catherine Burks-Brooks, Lucretia Collins and Salynn McCollum sit on a bench in the Birmingham Greyhound station on May 17, 1961. Soon after the photo was taken, the group was arrested and later released in a rural all-white area on the orders of Birmingham Commissioner of Public Safety Eugene “Bull” Connor. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Courtesy of The Birmingham News. All rights reserved. Used with permission)

Alabama was one of the places most resistant to racial integration and where some of the most violent backlashes against the Freedom Riders took place, including the firebombing of a bus outside Anniston and a bloody attack on riders by a white mob of men and women at a bus station in Montgomery.

This past July, Lewis took one more ride in Alabama. The body of the Alabama native, a 17-term congressman from Georgia, was carried across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in a horse-drawn carriage before laying in state at the Alabama Capitol. His casket was then flown to Washington, where Lewis lay in state in the U.S. Capitol rotunda, the first black member of Congress to be so honored.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis with U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell at a previous commemoration of Bloody Sunday in Selma. (contributed)

On last Sunday, 56 years to the day after Bloody Sunday, civil rights leaders gathered in Selma to commemorate the anniversary during the annual Selma Jubilee, with many more watching and participating virtually because of COVID-19 precautions.

The annual congressional pilgrimage is organized by The Faith & Politics Institute, a Washington-based nonprofit organization. According to the institute, its mission is to inspire political leaders to reflect and engage with one another for the betterment of the nation. In addition to the annual congressional pilgrimage, the institute hosts forums, conversations and visits to historic sites around the country.