America lost a hero on Friday. Not just blue America or red America, black America or white America. A nation that feels particularly fractious in these troubled times can at least unite in sorrow and mourning for the loss of John Lewis, the civil rights giant who made the United States better live up to its ideals.

The Georgia Democrat spent the final third of his life representing the state’s 5th District in the House of Representatives, but his career as a civil rights activist began a generation earlier. By age 20, Lewis had become one of the now-legendary Freedom Riders who used civil disobedience and nonviolent protests not just to enact social change, but also to push racist arms of government to enforce equal rights under the law.