As Congress debates the passage of a sweeping reform bill targeting voting rights , campaign finance, redistricting and ethics, Democrats in the House and Senate have the name of a colleague who is no longer with them on their lips.

Rep. John Lewis , who died last year, dedicated his life to expanding and protecting the right to vote. He was attacked for it. And he was elected, in part, to help preserve it. He ultimately helped write part of the bill that Democrats are now pushing to enact.

Let me close with this, Rep. John Sarbanes (D-Md.), the lead sponsor of the For the People Act, said at the end of his House floor comments March 2 before the bills final passage, John Lewis, who is not with us anymore, fought for voting rights. He knew the vote was sacred. He told us to keep our eyes on the prize. Today we do that.

Lewis, a civil rights leader and Georgia Democrat, died at the age of 80 from complications related to pancreatic cancer on July 17, 2020. As the head of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, he was the youngest speaker at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. In 1965, he led the march from Selma to Birmingham, Alabama, that left him with a broken skull after white police officers assaulted the marchers. Congress responded to the Bloody Sunday assault by passing the Voting Rights Act. As a congressman representing Atlanta for 34 years, he came to be known as the conscience of Congress, hosting members of both parties for annual pilgrimages to the bridge in Selma where, in his words, he gave a little blood.

In his eulogy for the late congressman, former President Barack Obama called on politicians to honor John by not only passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to restore the Voting Rights Act of 1965 but also to make it even better. Obama called for Congress to pass legislation to expand voting rights by making voter registration automatic, adding polling locations to eliminate long lines to vote, restoring voting rights to ex-felons and making Election Day a national holiday.

We should keep marching, Obama said.