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Slavery Quotes

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Slavery Quotes

“Grant began by expressing a hope that the war would soon be over, and Lee replied by stating that he had for some time been anxious to stop the further effusion of blood, and he trusted that everything would now be done to restore harmony and conciliate the people of the South. He said the emancipation of the Negroes would be no hindrance to the restoring of relations between the two sections of the country, as it would probably not be the desire of the majority of the Southern people to restore slavery then, even if the question were left open to them.”

People Ifs Said Two War Country Done Would Be Desire Left Blood Relation Harmony Slavery Majority South Civil War Grants Southern Anxious Trusted Sections Emancipation Restoring Hindrance

Author:Horace Porter

“The struggle to avert catastrophic climate change is bigger than all the other struggles, whether it is slavery, democracy struggles, the woman's right to vote, and so on I would argue that if what is at stake is securing life as we know it, then there can be no bigger struggle that we face.”

Ifs Knows Faces Struggle Democracy Vote Bigger Slavery Climate Climate Change Arguing Stakes Right To Vote Avert Others Struggles

Author:Kumi Naidoo

“[T]he hour is fast approaching, on which the Honor and Success of this army, and the safety of our bleeding Country depend. Remember officers and Soldiers, that you are Freemen, fighting for the blessings of Liberty - that slavery will be your portion, and that of your posterity, if you do not acquit yourselves like men.”

Source: Maxims of Washington: Political, Social, Moral, and Religious

“People who make war in order to escape slavery may possibly win....This will doubtless bring death and suffering to thousands....But people who tamely allow slavery to be imposed on them without resorting to a defensive war are inevitably doomed to years of death and suffering-and far more of each than any war would bring to them....The army doesn't exist that can annihilate men in their own land-not if they love it sufficiently.”

People Ifs Men Years May War Suffering Order Winning Land Army Slavery Antiwar Doomed

Author:Kenneth Roberts

“The division of the United States into federations of equal force was decided long before the Civil War by the high financial powers of Europe. These bankers were afraid that the United States, if they remained in one block and as one nation, would attain economic and financial independence, which would upset their financial domination over the world. The voice of the Rothschilds prevailed... Therefore they sent their emissaries into the field to exploit the question of slavery and to open an abyss between the two sections of the Union.”

“I am obliged to confess that I do not regard the abolition of slavery as a means of warding off the struggle of the two races in the Southern states. The Negroes may long remain slaves without complaining; but if they are once raised to the level of freemen, they will soon revolt at being deprived of almost all their civil rights; and as they cannot become the equals of the whites, they will speedily show themselves as enemies.”

Source: Democracy in America

“I apply the Abraham Lincoln test for moral casuistry: 'If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.' Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture.”

Ifs Wells Doe Moral Tests Slavery Torture Abraham

Book:Arguably

Source: Arguably

“If you are not the victim, don't examine it entirely from your point of view because when YOU'RE not the victim, it becomes pretty easy to rationalize and excuse cruelty, injustice, inequality, slavery, and even murder. But when you're the victim, things look a lot differently from that angle.”

Ifs Looks Easy Views Murder Victim Slavery Injustice Excuse Point Of View Cruelty Inequality Angle Rationalize

Author:Gary Yourofsky

“We have inherited a fear of memories of slavery. It is as if to remember and acknowledge slavery would amount to our being consumed by it. As a matter of fact, in the popular black imagination, it is easier for us to construct ourselves as children of Africa, as the sons and daughters of kings and queens, and thereby ignore the Middle Passage and centuries of enforced servitude in the Americas. Although some of us might indeed be the descendants of African royalty, most of us are probably descendants of their subjects, the daughters and sons of African peasants or workers.”

“If we are made in some degree for others, yet in a greater are we made for ourselves. It were contrary to feeling and indeed ridiculous to suppose that a man had less rights in himself than one of his neighbors, or indeed all of them put together. This would be slavery, and not that liberty which the bill of rights has made inviolable, and for the preservation of which our government has been charged.”

Source: The writings of Thomas Jefferson: being his autobiography, correspondence, reports, messages, addresses, and other writings, official and private : published by the order of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, from the original manuscripts, deposited in the Department of State

“If any race of people should not have guilt about slavery, it's Caucasians.”

People Ifs Should Race Slavery Guilt

Author:Rush Limbaugh

“It had been happy for me if I could have lived a private life in peace and plenty, enjoying all the happiness that results from a well-tempered society founded on mutual esteem. But the injury done my country, and the chains of slavery forging for all posterity, calls me forth to defend our common rights, and repel the bold invaders of the sons of freedom.”

Ifs Wells Country Done Enjoy Results Common Rights Son Slavery Esteem Chains Plenty If I Could Injury Mutual Call Me Private Life Posterity Invaders Forging

Author:Nathanael Greene

“If you want to know where you would have stood on slavery before the Civil War, don’t look at where you stand on slavery today. Look at where you stand on animal rights.”

Ifs Knows Want Looks War Today Animal Views Opinion History Rights Slavery Civil War Animal Rights Where You Stand Slavery Today

Author:Paul Watson

“If slavery be a sin, it is not yours. It does not rest on your action for its origin, on your consent for its existence. It is a common law right to property in the service of man; its origin was Divine decree.”

Ifs Men Doe Action Law Sin Common Existence Divine Slavery Property Consent Decree Common Law

Author:Jefferson Davis

“And we must beg Homer and the other poets not to be angry if we strike out these and similar passages, not because they are unpoetical, or unattractive to the popular ear, but because the greater the poetical charm in them, the less are they meet for the ears of boys and men who are meant to be free, and who should fear slavery more than death.”

Ifs Men Should Boys Greater Poet Ears Slavery Angry Strikes Charm Meant To Be Passages Plato Unattractive

Book:The Republic

Source: The Republic

“If a man really believes that God once upheld slavery; that he commanded soldiers to kill women and babes; that he believed in polygamy; that he persecuted for opinion's sake; that he will punish forever, and that he hates an unbeliever, the effect in my judgment will be bad. It always has been bad. This belief built the dungeons of the Inquisition. This belief made the Puritan murder the Quaker.”

Source: Interviews

“I hate it when they tell us how far we've came to be; as if our people's history started with slavery.”

People Ifs Hate I Hate Slavery Technique

Author:Immortal Technique

“The question may seem embarrassing, but it can be answered in a few words. For two people to live in peace they must both want peace; if one of them insists on using force to oblige the other to work for him and serve him, then the other, if he wishes to retain his dignity as a man and not be reduced to abject slavery, will be obliged in spite of his love of peace, to resist force with adequate means.”

People Ifs Men Want May Mean Two Seems Force Wish Dignity Slavery Spite Embarrassing His Love Adequate Obliged Few Words Adequate Means

Author:Errico Malatesta

“If the flag of an armed enemy of the U.S. is allowed to fly over government buildings, then it implies that slavery, or at least the threat of slavery, is sanctioned by that government and can still legally exist.”

Ifs Stills Government Enemy Building Slavery Threat Flags

Author:Amiri Baraka

“Can anything be imagined more abhorrent to every sentiment of generosity and justice, than the law which arms the rich with the legal right to fix, by assize, the wages of the poor? If this is not slavery, we have forgotten its definition. Strike the right of associating for the sale of labor from the privileges of a freeman, and you may as well bind him to a master, or ascribe him to the soil.”

Ifs Wells May Law Justice Poor Rich Masters Arms Labor Slavery Forgotten Privilege Definitions Strikes Generosity Soil Sentiments Wages Freeman Abhorrent

Author:William C. Bryant

“If the layman cannot participate in decision making, he will have to turn himself over, essentially blind, to a hermetic elite. ... [The fundamental question becomes] are we still capable of self-government and therefore freedom? Margaret Mead wrote in a 1959 issue of Daedalus about scientists elevated to the status of priests. Now there is a name for this elevation, when you are in the hands of-one hopes-a benevolent elite, when you have no control over your political decisions. From the point of view of John Locke, the name for this is slavery.”

“If Lincoln's primary goal in the War was not the abolition of slavery but simply to preserve the Union, the question arises: Why did the Union need preserving? Or, more pointedly, why did the Southern states want to secede?”

Ifs Want Needs War States Goal Slavery Unions Arise Primaries Preserves Civil War Southern Abolition Abolition Of Slavery

Author:G. Edward Griffin

“If slaves will make good soldiers, then our whole theory of slavery is wrong.”

Ifs War Whole Theory Slavery Slave Soldier Civil War Good Soldiers Us Civil War

Author:Howell Cobb

“But, sir, the great cause of complaint now is the slavery question, and the questions growing out of it. If there is any other cause of complaint which has been influential in any quarter, to bring about the crisis which is now upon us; if any State or any people have made the troubles growing out of this question, a pretext for agitation instead of a cause of honest complaint, Virginia can have no sympathy whatever, in any such feeling, in any such policy, in any such attempt. It is the slavery question. Is it not so?”

People Ifs Has Beens Made War States Feelings Causes Growing Trouble Honest Policy Crisis Slavery Civil War Quarters Complaints Influential Virginia Pretext Agitation No Sympathy

Author:John Brown Baldwin

“The moment this House undertakes to legislate upon this subject slavery, it dissolves the Union. Should it be my fortune to have a seat upon this floor, I will abandon it the instant the first decisive step is taken looking towards legislation of this subject. I will go home to preach, and if I can, practice, disunion, and civil war, if needs be. A revolution must ensue, and this republic sink in blood.”

Source: Remarks of Mr. Hammond, of South Carolina, on the Question of Receiving Petitions for the Abolition of Slavery in the District of Columbia

“My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.”

“Does man's freedom consist in revolting against all laws? We say no, in so far as laws are natural, economic, and social laws, not authoritatively imposed but inherent in things, in relations, in situations, the natural development of which is expressed by those laws. We say YES if they are political and juridical laws, imposed upon men by men.”

“Nothing could be more jolting and discordant with the vision of today's intellectuals than the fact that it was businessmen, devout religious leaders and Western imperialists who together destroyed slavery around the world. And if it doesn't fit their vision, it is the same to them as if it never happened.”

Ifs World Facts Today Together Religious Leader Vision Happened Fit Slavery Western Destroyed Around The World Businessman Religious Leaders

Author:Thomas Sowell

“What does Christianity mean today? National Socialism is a religion. All we lack is a religious genius capable of uprooting outmoded religious practices and putting new ones in their place. We lack traditions and ritual. One day soon National Socialism will be the religion of all Germans. My Party is my church, and I believe I serve the Lord best if I do his will, and liberate my oppressed people from the fetters of slavery. That is my gospel.”

“The Irishman frees himself from slavery when he realizes the truth that the capitalist system is the most foreign thing in Ireland. The Irish question is a social question. The whole age-long fight of the Irish people against their oppressors resolves itself in the last analysis into a fight for the mastery of the means of life, the sources of production, in Ireland. Who would own and control the land? The people, or the invaders; and if the invaders, which set of them - the most recent swarm of land thieves, or the sons of the thieves of a former generation?”

“Nor is the guilt entirely with the warmongers, plutocrats and demagogues. If people permit exploitation and regimentation in any name, they deserve their slavery. A tyrant does not make his tyranny possible. It is made by the people and not otherwise.”

People Ifs Doe Made Names Deserve Slavery Guilt Tyranny Permit Tyrants Exploitation Warmongers Regimentation

Author:Jack Parsons

“No, this is not what a fair God would do. And why does it not say anywhere in the Bible that slavery is wrong? It only says that you should treat your slaves well. Well, I don't care if you treat them well. How is it possible that it is not immoral to own another person? Why isn't that one of the Ten Commandments? 'Thou shalt not own another person.' You want to sit here and tell me that fornication is worse than owning someone?”

Ifs Want Should Wells Persons Doe Care Ten Fairs Treats Slavery Slave Don't Care I Don't Care Commandments Immoral Ten Commandments

Author:Mira Sorvino

“Slavery existed before the formation of this Union. It derived from the Constitution that recognition which it would not have enjoyed without the confederation. If the States had not united together, there would have been no obligation on adjoining States to regard any species of property unknown to themselves.”

Ifs Has Beens States Together United Constitution Regard Slavery Property Unions Species Obligation Recognition Enjoyed Formation Confederation

Author:Jefferson Davis

“If we are to cherish freedom, and to guard it, we must remember what the alternative is: the bread of affliction and the bitter herbs of slavery.”

Ifs Remember Slavery Bread Bitter Alternatives Cherish Affliction Herbs

Author:Jonathan Sacks

“Man is less interested in marriage, very much less interested. In fact not interested at all. If he agrees, he agrees only reluctantly - because marriage means responsibility. Marriage means bondage, marriage means now you are imprisoned. Now you are no more free to move with other women. For a man, marriage looks like a prison. For a woman, marriage looks like safety, security, a home. For a woman marriage means home, and for a man marriage means slavery. Total different beliefs, so they act differently. Conflicting beliefs.”

Ifs Men Looks Mean Different Facts Home Moving Belief Responsibility Marriage Security Agree Safety Slavery Prison Not Interested Bondage Different Beliefs

Author:Rajneesh

“If We allow Slaves, we act against the very Principles by which we associated together, which was to relieve the distressed.”

Ifs Together Principles Slavery Slave Governors

Book:General Oglethorpe's Georgia: 1738-43

Source: General Oglethorpe's Georgia: 1738-43

“The black family unit that had survived 150 years of slavery was decimated in less than 30 years by welfare payments that stopped if the family structure remained intact.”

Ifs Years Black Slavery Structure Welfare Survived Units Payment Black Family Family Unit

Author:Larry Burkett

“Any unarmed people are slaves, or are subject to slavery at any given moment. If the guns are taken out of the hands of the people and only the pigs have guns, then it's off to the concentration camps, the gas chambers, or whatever the fascists in America come up with. One of the democratic rights of the United States, the Second Amendment to the Constitution, gives the people the right to bear arms. However, there is a greater right; the right of human dignity that gives all men the right to defend themselves.”

“There is not only no free state which would now establish it, but there is no slave state, which, if it had had the free alternative as we now have, would have founded slavery.”

Ifs States Slavery Slave Alternatives Free State

Author:William H. Seward

“Whoever is fortunate enough to be an American citizen came into the greatest inheritance man has ever enjoyed. He has had the benefit of every heroic and intellectual effort men have made for many thousands of years, realized at last. If Americans should now turn back, submit again to slavery, it would be a betrayal so base the human race might better perish.”

“What if history was changed? slavery reversed Would black ladies see white boys and clinch they purse?”

Ifs Black White Boys Changed Slavery Rap What If Purses

Author:Fredro Starr

“It is said slavery is all we are fighting for, and if we give it up we give up all. Even if this were true, which we deny, slavery is not all our enemies are fighting for. It is merely the pretense to establish sectional superiority and a more centralized form of government, and to deprive us of our rights and liberties.”

Ifs Giving Said War Government Form Fighting Liberty Enemy Rights Military Giving Up Slavery Deny Civil War Superiority Pretense Forms Of Government Confederate Depriving

Author:Patrick Cleburne

“It's as if all identity has been stolen from them, except their identity as slaves.”

Ifs Has Beens Identity Slavery Slave Stolen

Author:Kevin Bales

“If you allow one single germ, one single seed of slavery to remain in the soil of America... that germ will spring up, that noxious weed will thrive, and again stifle the growth, wither the leaves, blast the flowers and poison the fair fruits of freedom.”

Ifs America Growth Flower Spring Fairs Slavery Fruit Seeds Poison Soil Thrive Weed Marijuana Blast Germs Stifling Withering

Book:Mistress of herself: speeches and letters of Ernestine L. Rose, early women's rights leader

Source: Mistress of herself: speeches and letters of Ernestine L. Rose, early women's rights leader

“If you think your lot in life has been hard read “Up From Slavery” by Booker T. Washington, and you may see how fortunate you have been.”

Ifs Thinking May Has Beens Hard Gratitude Slavery Fortunate

Author:Napoleon Hill

“Yes, twenty-seven million in slavery is a lot of people, but it is just .0043 percent of the world's population. Yes, $23 billion a year in slave-made products as services is a lot of money but it is exactly what Americans spent on Valentine's Day in 2005. If humans trafficking generates $32 billion in profits annually, that is still a tiny drop in the ocean of the world economy.”

“Adrian Rogers told us as often as he could he took the Bible literally. He illustrated by saying he believed the world was created in six 24-hour days. And he repeated this to make an impression upon us. In private (Jerry Vines was with us), I asked Rogers what he did with the slavery passages of the New Testament. Did he take them literally? He paused and said, 'Well, I believe slavery is a much-maligned institution. If we had slavery today, we would not have this welfare mess.'”

Ifs World Believe Wells Said Today I Believe Hours Six Institutions Slavery Impression Mess Welfare Passages Testament New Testament Roger Jerry Vines Slavery Today

Author:Adrian Rogers

“Is slavery - owner, victim, profit, and domination - exclusive to the human race? Have blacks, Jews, women and children been the only victims of this atrocity? Have not cows been enslaved? What about pigs, chickens, turkeys, fish, sheep? If they’re not enslaved, then what are they? Free?”

Ifs Humans Children Race Victim Slavery Fishes Profit Jew Human Race Owners Chickens Cows Sheep Pigs Domination Turkeys Exclusive Atrocities

Author:Gary Yourofsky

“We have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery.-Honor, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them, if we basely entail hereditary bondage upon them.”

Source: Jefferson Himself: The Personal Narrative of a Many-Sided American

“If you are living out of a sense of obligation you are slave.”

Ifs Spiritual Self Improvement Slavery Slave Obligation Be A Slave

Author:Wayne Dyer