One of the foot soldiers of the march for voting rights from Selma to Montgomery received the nation’s highest award given civilians Tuesday.

Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga. was chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and helped organize the first sit-ins at lunch counters that refused to serve blacks. In 1965, he led a march for voting rights and was nearly beaten to death on the Selmont side of the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the day that has become known as “Bloody Sunday.”

President Barack Obama recognized Lewis and 14 others, including former president George H.W. Bush with the Presidential Medal of Freedom for contributions to society the president said, speak to “who we are as a people.”

The honor is given in recognition of contributions to U.S. national security, world peace, culture or other significant public or private endeavors.

When he presented the award to Lewis, Obama said the congressman “knew that change could not wait for some other person or some other time.”

Lewis speaks often and loudly in his booming voice on issues of justice and equality, and is known as the “conscience” of Congress.

Lewis told reporters in attendance the award was even more special coming from Obama, the nation’s first black president.

“If someone had told me that one day I would be standing in the White House and an African-American president would be presenting me the Medal of Freedom I would say, ‘Are you crazy? Are you out of your mind?’” Lewis said. “It’s just an impossible dream.”

Some of the other medal recipients are:

• Dr. Tom Little, an optometrist who was murdered by the Taliban last August in Afghanistan
• John H. Adams, co-founder of Natural Resources Defense Council
• Maya Angelou, an author and poet
• Warren Buffett, chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway
• Jasper Johns, an artist whose work has dealt with themes of perception and identity.
• Gerda Weissmann Klein, Holocaust survivor and author who founded Citizenship Counts, an organization that teaches students to cherish being American citizens.
• Yo-Yo Ma, a world-renowned cellist and 16-time Grammy award winner who is known for his interpretations of Bach and Beethoven.
• Sylvia Mendez, a civil rights activist of Mexican and Puerto Rican descent.
• Angela Merkel, the first woman and first East German to serve as chancellor of a unified Germany.
• Stan Musial, Hall of Fame baseball player who spent 22 seasons with the St. Louis Cardinals.
• Bill Russell, the former captain of the Boston Celtics and first black man to become an NBA head coach.
• Jean Kennedy Smith, founder of VSA, a non-profit organization that promotes the artistic talents of people with disabilities.
• John J. Sweeney, president emeritus of the AFL-CIO.