Quotessence
Home / Authors / Nat Hentoff
Nat Hentoff

Nat Hentoff Quotes

Historian

Filter quotes by topic

AllPeopleBarackBillsKnowsThinkingSaidYearsIfsBookKind

Famous Nat Hentoff Quotes

“Carl Armstrong was one of those people in the anti-war years who had been so convinced of the righteousness of their cause that he and some friends decided they would blow up a building at the University of Wisconsin, in which they said research was being done to help the war against the Vietnamese. What they blew up at three or four in the morning was a young scientist, who was married and had a couple of kids, who wasn't working on war stuff at all. And he was killed.”

PeopleYearsSaidWarDoneHelpingKidsYoungThreeCausesStuffMorningFourBuildingCoupleMarriedResearchDecidedScientistUniversityBlowConvincedRighteousnessAnti WarThey SaidBeing DoneArmstrongWisconsinVietnamese
Author:Nat Hentoff
Create image

“I was less angry at [Carl] Armstrong, though I was angry at the people who came to his trial: Dan Ellsberg, who ordinarily I respected a lot; Philip Berrigan; the guy who teaches at Princeton still - I can't remember his name. And they were saying - well, they were saying, really, what Arthur Koestler had people saying on "Darkness at Noon." The means were unfortunate and, sadly, someone died, but the end is what is important and this was a great symbolic - something or other - sign against the war in Vietnam.”

PeopleWellsMeanStillsI CanImportantWarEndsRememberGuyNamesTeachDarknessDiedAngryTrialsVietnamUnfortunateSymbolicNoonArthurPhilipArmstrongPrincetonDarkness At Noon
Author:Nat Hentoff
Create image

“I was writing - at least beginning to write Boston Boy and there were a lot of holes in my so-called research. I didn't know the towns my mother and father came from in Russia. I didn't know the name of the clothing store I went to work for when I was 11 years old. I didn't know a lot of things. So I called for my FBI files, not expecting to have that stuff there, but I wanted to know what they had on me.But they did have the towns my mother and father lived in in Russia. They had the grocery store I worked in when I was 11 years old.”

KnowsWritingYearsWantedMotherFatherNamesStuffBoysResearchTownsStoresRussiaHolesClothingsExpectingBostonFilesFbiGroceriesMother And FatherGrocery Stores
Author:Nat Hentoff
Create image

“There's a black lawyer in Galveston, Texas, who was the unpaid NAACP general counsel in Texas. He had a great record in housing discrimination, labor discrimination. He decided to take as a client a member of the Ku Klux Klan because the state wanted to get the membership lists of the Klan to find out if they could get something on the Klan. And he said, `I got to take you. I despise you. But we, the NAACP, won that case; NAACP vs. Alabama in the 1950s. Nobody has the right to get your membership lists.' He was fired from the NAACP. To me, he's a hero.”

IfsSaidStatesWantedBlackCasesRecordsHeroMembersLaborDecidedLawyerListsDiscriminationTexasDespiseClientsHousingAlabamaMembershipKu Klux KlanNaacp
Author:Nat Hentoff
Create image

“Those who created this country chose freedom. With all of its dangers. And do you know the riskiest part of that choice they made? They actually believed that we could be trusted to make up our own minds in the whirl of differing ideas. That we could be trusted to remain free, even when there were very, very seductive voices - taking advantage of our freedom of speech - who were trying to turn this country into the kind of place where the government could tell you what you can and cannot do.”

KnowsTryingMindKindMadeIdeasCountryGovernmentTurnsChoicesVoiceDangerSpeechAdvantageDo You KnowTrustedFreedom Of SpeechSeductiveTaking Advantage
Author:Nat Hentoff
Create image