“That we suffer so much today under whatsoever flag we live is proof positive that constitutions and laws, when framed by the early advocates of human liberty, never included and were never intended for us as a people. It is only a question of sheer accident that we happen to be fellow citizens today with the descendants of those who, through their advocacy, laid the foundation for human rights.” PeopleHumansHappensTodayLawSufferingBlackLibertyRightsCitizensConstitutionFellowsFoundationInjusticeHuman RightsAccidentsProofFlagsSheerDescendantsAdvocacyFramed Book:Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey Source: Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey
“Darkroom: A Memoir in Black and White is remarkable for its truth-telling about two important issues concerning Alabama's past and present: the civil rights movement and immigration. These stories, rendered through the words and eyes of a young Latina girl who came from Argentina to Marion, Alabama, are made vivid and immediate through Weaver's highly accessible drawings and dialogue. This is a book-about maturation, family, education, and social change-every schoolchild, parent, and citizen should experience.” ShouldMadeTwoImportantBookStoriesEyePastYoungGirlSocialParentBlackWhiteIssuesRightsMovementCitizensDrawingImmigrationMemoirDialogueCivil RightsTelling The TruthRemarkableBlack And WhiteSocial ChangeVividCivil Rights MovementAlabamaPast And PresentArgentinaImportant IssuesLatinaWeaversThis Is A BookDarkroomFamily Education Author:Sena Jeter Naslund
“In a composite Nation like ours, made up of almost every variety of the human family, there should be, as before the Law, no rich, no poor, no high, no low, no black, no white, but one country, one citizenship equal rights and a common destiny for all. A government that cannot or does not protect the humblest citizen in his right to life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness, should be reformed or overthrown, without delay.” ShouldHumansDoeMadeCountryGovernmentLawNationsBlackWhitePoorCommonLibertyDestinyRichRightsCitizensProtectEqualLowsEqualityPursuitVarietyCitizenshipDelayEqual RightsPursuit Of HappinessRight To LifeHuman FamilyCompositesLife Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness Author:Frederick Douglass
“To the Baptist Churches on Neal's Greek on Black Creek, North Carolina I have received, fellow-citizens, your address, approving my objection to the Bill containing a grant of public land to the Baptist Church at Salem Meeting House, Mississippi Territory. Having always regarded the practical distinction between Religion and Civil Government as essential to the purity of both, and as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States, I could not have otherwise discharged my duty on the occasion which presented itself” StatesGovernmentReligionHouseBlackChurchUnitedUnited StatesLandDutyCitizensEssentialsConstitutionFellowsBillsMeetingsPracticalsOccasionsGreekPurityDistinctionAddressesGrantsTerritoryBaptistsObjectionsMississippiCarolinaContainingNorth CarolinaConstitution Of The United StatesCreeksApprovingSalemPublic Lands Author:James Madison
“Black folk, a lot of us lived as victims in a certain part of our history. And we had to really erase that tape. We're not victims. We are citizens.” CertainBlackCitizensRacismVictimFolksTapeErase Author:Dorothy Cotton
“There's an old saying in the black community that everybody else is protected and served but we are policed, we don't want to be policed. We want to be protected and served as any American citizen.” WantBlackCommunityCitizensProtectedAmerican CitizensOld SayingBlack Community Author:Benjamin Crump
“Intellectual traditions emerging from populations that have always been the constitutive other in the development of the properly free citizen - indigenous people, populations labeled physically or mentally unfit, black people, migrants, women, prisoners - have always produced robust critiques of the what Dylan Rodriguez calls "white bourgeois freedom."” PeopleBlackWhiteDevelopmentCitizensIntellectualTraditionPopulationPrisonerBlack PeopleDylanIndigenousEmergingCritiqueBourgeoisRobustMigrantsIndigenous People Author:Dean Spade
“Mr. president, I've been a citizen of the United States of America for thirty three years and was never invited to the White House. It sure gives me pleasure to be invited to the Black House.” GivingYearsStatesAmericaThreeHouseBlackPresidentWhitePleasureUnitedUnited StatesCitizensGive MeThirtyWhite HouseThree YearsUnited States Of AmericaInvited Author:Muhammad Ali
“The elective franchise is withheld from one half of its citizens...because the word 'people,' by an unparalleled exhibition of lexicon graphical acrobatics, has been turned and twisted to mean all who were shrewd and wise enough to have themselves born boys instead of girls, or who took the trouble to be born white instead of black.” PeopleMeanHas BeensEnoughGirlBlackBornWhiteHalfBoysWiseTroubleCitizensTwistedExhibitionsOne HalfLexiconAcrobatics Author:Mary Church Terrell
“That is another theme in the book [Dreams from My Father]. How do we exercise more empathy in our public discourse? How do we get the black to see through the eyes of the white? Or the citizen to see through the eyes of the immigrant? Or the straight to see through the eyes of the gay? That has always been a struggle in our politics.” BookDreamEyeFatherBlackWhiteStruggleCitizensExerciseGayEmpathyThemeImmigrantsDiscourseThrough The EyesPublic DiscourseDreams From My Father Author:Barack Obama
“Donald Trump first gained political prominence leading the charge for the so-called birthers. He promoted the racist lie that President Obama is not really an American citizen, part of a sustained effort to delegitimize America's first black president.” FirstsAmericaPoliticalLyingBlackPresidentEffortTrumpCitizensRacistPresident ObamaAmerican CitizensProminence Author:Hillary Clinton
“I don't care if it's five dead cops, a dead black citizen in Minnesota or in Louisiana, there are people trying to profit from it, politically profit from it. It's undeniable. I think it's cheap and I think it's sick. But they are there. And you and I both know who they are.” PeopleIfsThinkingKnowsTryingCareBlackFiveCitizensSickProfitDon't CareI Don't CareCopLouisianaMinnesota Author:Rush Limbaugh
“Mr. [Donald] Trump, for five years, you perpetuated a false claim that the nation's first black president was not a natural-born citizen. You questioned his legitimacy. In the last couple of weeks, you acknowledged what most Americans have accepted for years: The president was born in the United States.” YearsFirstsStatesLastsNationsBlackPresidentBornNaturalUnitedUnited StatesFiveWeekTrumpCoupleCitizensClaimsAcceptedFive YearsLegitimacy Author:Lester Holt
“[Donald Trump] has really started his political activity based on this racist lie that our first black president was not an American citizen. There was absolutely no evidence for it, but he persisted, he persisted year after year, because some of his supporters, people that he was trying to bring into his fold, apparently believed it or wanted to believe it.” PeopleTryingYearsFirstsBelieveWantedPoliticalLyingBlackPresidentTrumpCitizensActivityEvidenceRacistSupporterFoldsAmerican Citizens Author:Hillary Clinton
“The fact is that in my prep school, I went to a boarding school, 39 young men graduated from that prep school. Five years later, a quarter of us were in SDS, in Students for Democratic Society. Not because we were particularly chosen or because we were as I say, we were lucky but we were mainly luckily to grow up at a time where this black freedom movement was really defining the moral character of what it meant to be a citizen and a person.” MenYearsPersonsCharacterFactsSchoolYoungGrowsBlackMoralGrowing UpFiveMovementStudentsCitizensLuckyDemocraticChosenYoung ManFive YearsMeant To BeQuartersDefiningDemocratic SocietyMoral CharacterPreps Author:Bill Ayers
“I especially appreciated hearing the President [Barack Obama] affirm that "black lives matter" and that it means that some citizens are feeling more pain, and experiencing more negative effects than others, and he offered up the stats. He also indicated that black lives matter does not negate the fact that blue lives matter. He ably walked the tightrope, here, between affirming both black life and police life.” MeanDoeMatterFactsFeelingsPainBlackPresidentEffectsCitizensNegativePoliceBlueHearingBarackAppreciatedBlack Lives MatterPresident Barack ObamaAffirmingBlack Lives Author:Julianne Malveaux
“I think our duty as American citizens is to be involved and engaged in anything that affects us. As an artist, I have to use my platform, and as a dad, a brother, and a black man, I have to be as socially woke and present as possible.” ThinkingMenUseArtistBlackBrotherDutyDadCitizensInvolvedEngagedPlatformsAmerican Citizens Author:Chance the Rapper
“I think of what's happening in Detroit as part of something that's much bigger. Most people think of the decline of the city as having to do with African-Americans and being in debt, and all the issues like crime and bad housing. But what happened is that when globalization took place, following World War II, Detroit's role as the center and the symbol of industrialization was destroyed. It wasn't because we had black citizens mainly or a black mayor; it was because the world was changing.” PeopleThinkingWorldWarBlackCitiesRolesIssuesHappenedCrimeCitizensHappeningsBiggerFollowingDebtDestroyedSymbolsAfrican AmericanWar Of The WorldsWorld War IiDeclineWorld War IGlobalizationHousingMayorsDetroitIndustrialization Author:Grace Lee Boggs
“I thought of New York as a free city, like one of those prewar nests of intrigue and licentiousness where exiles and lamsters and refugees found shelter in a tangle of improbable juxtapositions. I had never gotten around to changing my nationality from the one assigned me at birth, but I would have declared myself a citizen of New York City had such a stateless state existed, its flag a solid black.” StatesFoundBlackCitiesNew YorkBirthCitizensNew York CityFlagsShelterRefugeeIntrigueExileNationalityNestsImprobableJuxtaposition Author:Luc Sante
“Freedom is a struggle, and we do it together. Not only together as black citizens, but black and white together.” TogetherBlackWhiteStruggleCitizensBlack And White Author:Andrew Young