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1
HOUSE RESOLUTION

 
2    WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois House of
3Representatives are saddened to learn of the death of former
4U.S. Representative John James Conyers Jr.; and
 
5    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers was born in Highland Park, Michigan
6on May 16, 1929 and grew up in Detroit; he attended Wayne State
7University, where he received both his undergraduate and law
8degrees; he served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War as
9part of a unit of African-American combat engineers; and
 
10    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers became a civil rights activist and
11took part in the voting rights efforts in Selma, Alabama in
121963; he also served as an aide to U.S. Rep. John Dingell; and
 
13    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers made his first run for Congress after
14Michigan's congressional districts had been redrawn after a
151962 Supreme Court decision that made it unconstitutional to
16draw districts in a way that under-represents minority voters;
17one of his early supporters in his 1964 campaign was Rosa
18Parks; he hired her after the election, and she remained on his
19staff until she retired in 1988; and
 
20    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers was consistently a progressive
21voice; he supported such liberal causes as gun control,

 

 

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1anti-poverty programs, and universal health care; he held
2hearings to spotlight police misconduct and also supported
3legislation urging a study of the possibility of offering
4reparations to the descendants of slaves; and
 
5    WHEREAS, Just days after the 1968 assassination of the Rev.
6Martin Luther King Jr., Rep. Conyers introduced a resolution
7calling for a national holiday in his name, which took 15 years
8to come to fruition; and
 
9    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers retired on December 5, 2017; his
10service in Congress spanned 10 presidencies and 52 years; he
11was in the U.S. House of Representatives for over one-fifth of
12the entire existence of the U.S. Congress; in 1964, he went to
13Jim Crow Mississippi during Freedom Summer and offered legal
14representation to black voting-rights activists, and one year
15later, he was in Congress supporting the Voting Rights Act as a
16member of the U.S. House of Representatives; and
 
17    WHEREAS, Rep. Conyers was the only congressman ever
18endorsed by Martin Luther King Jr.; therefore, be it
 
19    RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE
20HUNDRED FIRST GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that
21we mourn the passing of former U.S. Representative John Conyers
22and extend our sincere condolences to his family, friends, and

 

 

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1all who knew and loved him; and be it further
 
2    RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
3presented to the family of Rep. Conyers as an expression of our
4deepest sympathy.