OXFORD, Ohio -- Miami University will honor U.S. Rep. John Lewis this week for his civil rights accomplishments.
The university will award its Freedom Summer of '64 Award to the Democratic congressman from Georgia at the Sam Rayburn House Office Building in Washington on Monday. Lewis was a leader in the 1964 Freedom Summer voter registration drive of blacks in the South. College students were recruited to aid that effort.
Miami says nearly 800 volunteers came to the then-Western College for Women to train for that work and for nonviolent resistance. That campus is now part of Miami University.
Miami's president, Gregory Crawford, said the award honors Lewis and the legacy of the civil rights movement and serves as a call for others to reconnect with civic service and civil rights.
