New York Times columnist and Pulitzer-prize winning writer Anthony Lewis passed away this weekend. Lewis was a leading expert on constitutional law whose work in defense of free speech earned him the Presidential Citizens Medal in 2001.
We honored Lewis’ lifetime commitment to freedom of expression in 2008 at our annual benefit.
In his 2007 book Freedom for the Thought That We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment, Lewis wrote:
Citizens in a free society must have courage — the courage to hear not only unwelcome political speech but novel and shocking ideas in science and the arts.
Words worth remembering every day. Thank you, Anthony Lewis — you will be missed.