Civil Rights Quotes - Page 24

• Because of the Civil Rights movement, new doors of opportunity and education swung open for everybody ... Not just for blacks and whites, but also women and Latinos; and Asians and Native Americans; and gay Americans and Americans with a disability. They swung open for you, and they swung open for me. And that's why I'm standing here today-because of those efforts, because of that legacy.

  Barack Obama

  Inspiring, Native American, Gay

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• The Cause of civil liberty must not be surrendered at the end of one, or even one hundred defeats.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Liberty, Causes, Defeat

  Abraham Lincoln, Mario Matthew Cuomo, G. S. Boritt (2004). “Lincoln on Democracy”, p.136, Fordham Univ Press

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• Of the liberty of conscience in matters of religious faith, of speech and of the press; of the trial by jury of the vicinage in civil and criminal cases; of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus; of the right to keep and bear arms.... If these rights are well defined, and secured against encroachment, it is impossible that government should ever degenerate into tyranny.

  James Monroe

  Religious, Rights, Government

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• The Pledge of Allegiance says "...with liberty and justice for all." What part of "all" don't you understand?

  Patricia Schroeder

  Peace, Justice For All, Liberty

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• We need not throw away 200 years of American jurisprudence while we fight terrorism. We need not choose between our most deeply held values, and keeping this nation safe.

  Barack Obama

  Fighting, Years, Needs

  'Countdown with Keith Olbermann', www.nbcnews.com. June 19, 2008.

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• I also wish that the Pledge of Allegiance were directed at the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as it is when the President takes his oath of office, rather than to the flag and the nation

  Carl Sagan

  Rights, Oath Of Office, Wish

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.546, Ballantine Books

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• The constitution does not provide for first and second class citizens.

  Wendell Willkie

  Equality, Class, Doe

  An American Program ch. 2 (1944)

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• You reached your level, you don't want any more. We asked ten years ago, we were askin' with the Panthers, we were askin' in the Civil Rights Movement. Now those who were askin' are all dead or in jail, wo what are we gonna do? And we shouldn't be angry!?

  Tupac Shakur

  Rapper, Rights, Years

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• I spent my entire career trying to protect the Constitution, the civil rights and the civil liberties of American citizens and people who are here lawfully. I, as chair of this commission, would not be a party to any system that I felt was an unpardonable intrusion into the private lives of people. If I felt that what we are recommending would be such an intrusion I can assure you that recommendation would never have seen the light of day, not even as a pilot program.

  Barbara Jordan

  Party, Rights, Light

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• We must not always judge of the generality of the opinion by the noise of the acclamation.

  Edmund Burke

  Judging, Liberty, Noise

  Edmund Burke (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Edmund Burke (Illustrated)”, p.3831, Delphi Classics

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• Kings or parliaments could not give the rights essential to happiness... We claim them from a higher source - from the King of kings, and Lord of all the earth. They are not annexed to us by parchments and seals. They are created in us by the decrees of Providence, which establish the laws of our nature. They are born with us; exist with us; and cannot be taken from us by any human power, without taking our lives.

  John Dickinson

  Kings, Taken, Rights

  John Dickinson (2009). “The Writings of John Dickinson”, p.262, Applewood Books

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• Whereas each man claims his freedom as a matter of right, the freedom he accords to other men is a matter of toleration.

  Walter Lippmann

  Men, Tolerance, Liberty

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• In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as 'right-to-work.' It provides no 'rights' and no 'works.' Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining…. We demand this fraud be stopped.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Fighting, Rights, Labor Laws

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• [Button] If Gay and Lesbian people are given civil rights, soon everyone will want them

  James Howe

  Gay, Rights, Lgbt Pride

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• [Christian rebellion] arises from the doctrine of mankind made in the image of God, and therefore protests against all forms of dehumanization. It sets itself against the social injustices which insult God the Creator, seeks to protect human beings from oppression and longs to liberate them… it protests against every authoritarian regime, whether of the left or of the right, which discriminates against minorities, denies people their civil rights, forbids the free expression of opinions or imprisons people for their views alone.

  John Stott

  Christian, Rights, Views

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• Neither Pagan nor Mahamedan nor Jew ought to be excluded from the civil rights of the Commonwealth because of his religion. -quoting John Locke's argument.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Rights, Argument, Pagan

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• It was civil disobedience that won them their civil rights.

  Tariq Ali

  Rights, Civil Disobedience, Disobedience

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• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was the most sweeping civil rights legislation of its day, and included women's rights as part of its reforms. Ironically, the section on women's rights was added by a senator from Virginia who opposed the whole thing and was said to be sure that if he stuck something about womens' rights into it, it would never pass. The bill passed anyway, though, much to the chagrin of a certain wiener from Virginia.

  Adam Selzer

  Rights, Virginia, Reform

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

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Rights, Opinion

  B. L. Rayner, Thomas Jefferson (1834). “Life of Thomas Jefferson: with selections from the most valuable portions of his voluminious and unrivalled private correspondence : with portrait”, p.138

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• I am for freedom of religion, and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendency of one sect over another.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Change, Religious, Religion

  Thomas Jefferson, Brett F. Woods (2009). “Thomas Jefferson: Thoughts on War and Revolution : Annotated Correspondence”, p.143, Algora Publishing

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• ....we ain't doing civil rights here. We just telling stories like they really happen.

  Kathryn Stockett

  Rights, Stories, Happens

  Kathryn Stockett (2009). “The Help”, p.208, Penguin

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• Religious institutions that use government power in support of themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths, or of no faith, undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of an established religion tends to make the clergy unresponsive to their own people, and leads to corruption within religion itself. Erecting the 'wall of separation between church and state,' therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Wall, Rights

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• This bill, by vesting the power to withhold or terminate Federal funds, creates a concentration of power of economic coercion unequaled in the history of governments-a power concentration which defies the experience of mankind with the temptation of power to corrupt.

  Strom Thurmond

  Government, Temptation, Bills

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• ...this bill will require the creation of a Federal police force of mammoth proportions. It also bids fair to result in the development of an 'informer' psychology in great areas of our national life-neighbors spying on neighbors, workers spying on workers, business spying on businessmen-were those who would harass their fellow citizens for selfish and narrow purposes will have ample inducement to do so. These, the Federal police force an 'informer' psychology, are the hallmarks of the police state and landmarks in the destruction of a free society.

  Barry Goldwater

  Selfish, Police, Psychology

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• By its attempt to regulate and govern the private businesses, which are miscalled public accommodations in the bill, this proposal would inject the Government into the most sensitive areas of human contractual relations-agreements for personal services. In so doing, constitutional interpretations of long standing are being swept aside in favor of tortuous rationalizations which studiously ignore the constitutionally-forbidden imposition of involuntary servitude on citizens

  Strom Thurmond

  Agreement, Government, Long

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