--- title: Bob Moses Remembers the Fighting Spirit of John Lewis description: Lewis "was like a pit bull" in the fight for equality, recalls his fellow SNCC activist. canonical: https://time.com/5870300/bob-moses-john-lewis/ author: Bob Moses article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2020-07-23T12:00:07.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-24T09:02:01.057Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Bob Moses Remembers the Fighting Spirit of John Lewis og:description: "He was the person who was going to jail. Whatever actions happened, he was right there." og:url: https://time.com/5870300/bob-moses-john-lewis/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbda19b2b86037d8e/698a1094011682e61297fa25/michael-avedon-john-lewis-portrait-feature-image.jpg?branch=production&width=1120&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1120 og:image:height: 630 og:image:alt: michael-avedon-john-lewis-portrait-feature-image og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Bob Moses Remembers the Fighting Spirit of John Lewis twitter:description: "He was the person who was going to jail. Whatever actions happened, he was right there." twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbda19b2b86037d8e/698a1094011682e61297fa25/michael-avedon-john-lewis-portrait-feature-image.jpg?branch=production&width=1120&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # 'He Was Like a Pit Bull': Bob Moses on John Lewis' Fighting Spirit > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Inside TIME: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Inside TIME is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. A closer look at TIME's latest cover and our most compelling stories. Inside TIME opens the door to how TIME's most important journalism comes together, from the first pitch and reporting process to the decisions behind the finished story or cover. 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Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. by [Bob Moses](https://time.com/author/bob-moses/) ## Bob Moses Jul 23, 2020 12:00 PM UTC  Michael Avedon by [Bob Moses](https://time.com/author/bob-moses/) ## Bob Moses Jul 23, 2020 12:00 PM UTC In the early 1960s, SNCC \[the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee\] had decided it would just do voter registration in Mississippi. I had gone down to work on that program, and my work was very confined to that. But [John](https://time.com/5697668/john-lewis-dies/), in those years, was focused on direct action. He was the person who was going to jail. Whatever actions happened, he was right there. When he was \[elected chair of SNCC in 1963\], you had sophisticated Howard students very much involved, and John was the candidate from the rural South. His persistence and moral clarity prevailed in the vote. You were sure you had someone who wasn’t going to somehow dilute the message. John was just straight as an arrow. Then came the March on Washington, with [the whole brouhaha about his speech](https://time.com/5657992/john-lewis-march-on-washington-speech/) and the part that got ­deleted—about marching the way Sherman did—that was really typical John. He was like a pit bull: _I’m going to go on, and I’m going to grab this, and I’m not turning this loose, and it doesn’t matter what you do._ But the reason John’s [direct actions](https://time.com/5354626/john-lewis-civil-rights-movement/) had the impact they did was because he was immersed in a larger movement with a structure. No one knew how to create the sit-in movement, but after Ella Baker helped give it structure, John emerged from within this structure. He went through the training, which involved a commitment to nonviolence as a way of life. John exuded nonviolence. He talked about it until the day he died. And what we got out of \[this activism\] was the Congressional Black Caucus. What John accomplished was the elevation of the young person at the bottom of society. You weren’t going to get more rural, more Southern, more inundated in Black rural culture than this son of Alabama sharecroppers. He rose up and reached a point where, at the March on Washington, the powers that be have to try to shape what he’s going to say, because what he’s going to say counts. _—As told to Olivia B. Waxman_ _This story appears in the Aug. 3, 2020, issue of TIME_ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5870300/bob-moses-john-lewis/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5870300/bob-moses-john-lewis/"},"headline":"'He Was Like a Pit Bull': Bob Moses on John Lewis' Fighting Spirit","datePublished":"2020-07-23T12:00:07.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-24T09:02:01.057Z","description":"\"He was the person who was going to jail. 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