AUSTIN, Texas — They gathered just after 2 p.m. on a sunny but windy Wednesday in January.
One might think the grief would be lessened after two days of moving tributes.
But as they gathered around the white casket adorned with yellow roses, tears still flowed because it was the final goodbye, but it was also the beginning of a call to action.
No matter how much former longtime Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson accomplished, she often told people there was more work to do.
She was laid to rest at the Texas State Cemetery just a few blocks from the Capitol, where she once served as a state representative -- the first Black woman to hold any elected office in Dallas.
“We’ll remember she had to toil the fields when people who had the color of our skins couldn’t get to first base in Texas,” said State Sen. Royce West, who still considers himself one of Johnson’s mentees. “She went outside Texas to get an education.”
She is now buried in the same cemetery as Stephen F. Austin, Governors John Connally, Ann Richards, Mark White, and Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock.
Amid prayers, scripture, and a stirring hymn sung by her daughter-in-law and others, speakers wove a common thread: it’s time to get to work in Johnson’s honor.
“Just like when John Lewis said we have to engage in good trouble, Eddie Bernice says there’s work that needs to be done and we will remember that,” West said.
“That work she’s left unfinished - we’ll continue to do that work to make certain her legacy is fulfilled.”
The pastor who presided over the burial prayed for mourners to be a light in the darkness and, in 2024, to be “willing to vote like we have never voted before.”
“Don’t just talk the talk, walk the walk,” he said.
Johnson was a passionate advocate for minority rights, women’s rights, and voting rights.
“She will continue to speak from the grave,” her son, Dawrence Kirk Johnson, Sr., said. “It’s up to those who still stand to take up the mantle and help finish some undone work.”