Civil Rights Quotes

Never be content to sit back and watch as others' rights are trampled upon. Your rights could be next.

There are all kinds of ways to be in the world. And no matter what has happened to us, or what we have been told, or what we have believed, we get to choose our way.

Freedom rings bells to wake us from the comfort of beautiful dreams and empower the efforts that turn them into reality.

I knew that, in a large degree, we were trying an experiment--that of testing whether or not it was possible for Negroes to build up and control the affairs of a large education institution. I knew that if we failed it wold injure the whole race.

…in recent history the Democrat Party has created the illusion that their agenda and their policies are what’s best for black people. Somehow it’s been forgotten that the Republican Party was founded in 1854 as an abolitionist movement with one simple creed: that slavery is a violation of the rights of man.

Although the principle of equality has always been self-evident, it has never been self-executing.

If the system were designed to protect adoptees, why do so many have to fight for their rights?

Only until all human beings begin to recognize themselves as human beings will prejudice be gone forever. People ask me what race I am, but there is no such thing as race. I just answer: "I’m a member of the human race.

Sixty millions of whites are in no danger from the presence here of eight millions of blacks. The destinies of the two races, in this country, are indissolubly linked together, and the interests of both require that the common government of all shall not permit the seeds of race hate to be planted under the sanction of law.

The Algerians were revolutionsists, they wanted land. France offered to let them be integrated into France. They told France, to hell with Fance, they wanted some land, not some France.

We want trumpets that sound like thunder, and men to act as though they were going to war with those corrupt and degrading principles that rob one of all rights, merely because he is ignorant, and of a little different color. Let us have principles that will give every one his due; and then shall wars cease, and the weary find rest.

Get off of my shoulders. The foundation has been laid, now its time for you to build on it and get to work.

Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions any more than our opinions in physics or geometry...

I watched as people went to the memorial reading the names. I started at the first entry from 1954. I read each one quietly but out loud to myself, like I’d done with the names of those in the museum. I felt somehow they were getting the message that their sacrifice was known and their voice was heard.

People always say that I didn't give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn't true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.

People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.

Justice is what love sounds like when it speaks in public.

Being an American is about having the right to be who you are. Sometimes that doesn't happen.

I recall Ghandi said ultimately all things devolve into the political, but I'd argue that all things devolve into pro-people and anti-people. And I can pose the question, which side are you on?

I consider myself an American African because we did not come by choice.

Privilege is when you can afford to sit back and watch as others' rights are trampled upon.

It [freedom] rings bells to remind humanity that the most precious gifts in life––like children and love and time––must never be taken for granted.

You can either have individual liberty, or dependence on the government. One is designed to undo the other.

People often call fighting racism being 'PC' when they don't want to confront their own prejudice

When people have a controversial opinion about an event or a prominent figure, it can significantly increase conflicts of interests that can result people to be socially excluded who don't share the same perspective as them. The way people can end conflicts of interests is to negotiate their conflicting views and unite in order to establish tranquility.

Tolerance of intolerance enables oppression.

Lush, detailed, total-immersion storytelling.–Kirkus Review

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.

Slavery is a memory of something we cannot remember, and yet we cannot forget.

I do not think I was a hothead—not then and not now. I thought I was right. I had read the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bible. Segregation seemed evil from the time I was a boy. Slavery is an abomination on the American soul, ineradicable stain on our body politic. But Penn Center lit a fire that has never gone out, and the election of President Barack Obama was one of the happiest days of my life.

The most important gift you can give your children is the importance of standing up to injustice. Children will remember moments spent with you. However, it isn't togetherness that creates humane parents and righteous kids. It is the example of integrity that a parent sets and the on going lessons they teach about compassion toward others throughout their lives. A good father or mother teaches their children that cruelty is not something you cause or ignore, rather it is the moment you suit up for war.

Our freedoms are vanishing. If you do not get active to take a stand now against all that is wrong while we still can, then maybe one of your children may elect to do so in the future, when it will be far more riskier — and much, much harder.