Letter from Our CEO: Good Trouble | July 2020

“When you see something that is not right, not just, not fair, you have a moral obligation to say something. To do something.”  — John Lewis

“Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.”  — John Lewis

Earlier this month, we lost two giants of the civil rights and human rights movement when CT Vivian (age 95) and John Lewis (age 80) both passed away on July 24th.  Because of their lives, this country and world is a better place, and their words and examples are needed now as much as at any time in the last 50 years.

The Rev. CT Vivian, who Martin Luther King called “the greatest preacher who’s ever lived,” participated in his first demonstration in 1947 at age 23 when he and others successfully desegregated a lunch counter in Peoria, IL.  More than a decade later in 1960, as a student at American Baptist Theological Seminary (ABTS) in Nashville, TN, he and fellow-ABTS student John Lewis, and other students from ABTS, Fisk, and Tennessee State University trained for six months in non-violence philosophy and tactics before they began a sit-in campaign to desegregate lunch counters.  The demonstrators were brutally beaten, abused, arrested – and were unshakeable.  In the course of three weeks’ time they succeeded in having Nashville become the first Southern city to desegregate its lunch counters – overturning more than a century of entrenched customs and laws.

I am amazed at the young ages that Vivian and Lewis began their social justice efforts – John Lewis was 23 when he spoke at the March on Washington.  Even more so, I’m impressed at the longevity and consistency with which they acted upon, and lived out, their values and ideals throughout their lives.  In the words of John Lewis, our struggle for justice is a life-long one.  We are never too young – or too old (John Lewis conducted a sit-in at age 78!) – to make “good trouble”.

I know their example will inspire and nurture my resolve to be active right now in the current rising up for social justice and human rights – and for many years afterwards.   I hope they will sustain yours, too.

In solidarity,

Bobby Watts

Chief Executive Officer
National Health Care for the Homeless Council
bwatts@nhchc.org