RICHMOND, Va. -- Virginia's state flag will be lowered to half-staff until sunset on July 30 in honor of United States Representative John R. Lewis, who died on July 17.
The congressman and civil rights icon had been undergoing treatment in his battle with stage 4 pancreatic cancer.
Lewis, a Democrat, served 17 terms in the House of Representatives, representing Georgia’s 5th congressional district since 1987.
Along with Martin Luther King Jr., Lewis was one of the “Big Six” civil rights activists who organized the March on Washington in 1963. Lewis was perhaps best known for leading hundreds of protesters in the Bloody Sunday march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama in 1965.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.