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The American civil rights movement leader Joseph Lowery died on Friday at the age of 98, his family said.
A charismatic and fiery preacher, Lowery helped the Rev Martin Luther King Jr to fight against racial discrimination and led the Southern Christian Leadership Conference for two decades – restoring its financial stability and pressuring businesses not to trade with South Africa’s apartheid-era regime. He retired in 1997.
Lowery, considered the dean of civil rights veterans, lived to celebrate a November 2008 milestone that few of his movement colleagues thought they would ever witness: the election of an African American president. At an emotional victory celebration for Barack Obama in Atlanta, Lowery said: “America tonight is in the process of being born again.”
An early and enthusiastic supporter of Obama over then-Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, Lowery also gave the benediction at Obama’s inauguration.
In 2009 Obama awarded Lowery the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour in the US.
...
Joseph Lowery, American civil rights leader, dies at 98 (Guardian)
A charismatic and fiery preacher, Lowery helped the Rev Martin Luther King Jr to fight against racial discrimination and led the Southern Christian Leadership Conference for two decades – restoring its financial stability and pressuring businesses not to trade with South Africa’s apartheid-era regime. He retired in 1997.
Lowery, considered the dean of civil rights veterans, lived to celebrate a November 2008 milestone that few of his movement colleagues thought they would ever witness: the election of an African American president. At an emotional victory celebration for Barack Obama in Atlanta, Lowery said: “America tonight is in the process of being born again.”
An early and enthusiastic supporter of Obama over then-Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, Lowery also gave the benediction at Obama’s inauguration.
In 2009 Obama awarded Lowery the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour in the US.
...
Joseph Lowery, American civil rights leader, dies at 98 (Guardian)
