«America’s Pastor» shares the honor with 11 presidents and other distinguished Americans .
He felt stung by the politics that helped define his life — and resolved to keep a distance. But in death, the Rev. Billy Graham is getting a rare tribute from the nation’s top political leaders under Capitol Rotunda.
President Donald Trump, House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are expected Wednesday to remember “America’s pastor,” who died a week earlier at age 99. Some 30 family members will accompany Graham’s casket to Washington, where he befriended presidents of both parties and counseled others over seven decades.
Graham is lying in honor beneath the iconic dome Wednesday, before a funeral Friday near his home in Charlotte, North Carolina.
“If there is any American whose life and life’s work deserves to be honored by laying in honor in the U. S. Capitol, it’s Billy Graham,” Ryan said.
Graham shares the honor with 11 presidents and other distinguished Americans, starting with Sen. Henry Clay of Kentucky in 1852 and, most recently, Sen. Daniel Inouye of Hawaii in 2012, according to the House and the Architect of the Capitol.
Graham is only the fourth private person to lie in honor since 1998. The others are two U. S. Capitol Police officers who died in the line of duty in 1998 and civil rights hero Rosa Parks in 2005.
