(CNN) – Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat who was the youngest keynote speaker at the 1963 March on Washington, says on the fiftieth anniversary of the landmark event that the civil rights movement allowed young people’s lives to take on a purpose.
“During the height of the civil rights movement, we grew up, we had something to stand up for,” he told CNN chief political correspondent Candy Crowley on “State of the Union.”
“We had something to believe in. I grew up - I literally grew up on lunch counter stools or going on the Freedom Ride or participating in a march,” he continued. “You had a sense of purpose. You had goals: that we wanted to desegregate the lunch counters, the restaurants, to gain the right to vote.”