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Slavery Quotes

Browse 2495 quotes about Slavery.

Slavery Quotes

“I think of the old slavery, and of the way The Economy has now improved upon it. The new slavery has improved upon the old by giving the new slaves the illusion that they are free. The Economy does not take people's freedom by force, which would be against its principles, for it is very humane. It buys their freedom, pays for it, and then persuades its money back again with shoddy goods and the promise of freedom. "Buy a car," it says, "and be free. Buy a boat and be free." Is this not the raw material of bad dreams? Or is it maybe the very nightmare itself?”

Source: Jayber Crow: A Novel

“Slavery is a condition imposed upon individuals or races not sufficiently able to protect or defend themselves, and so long as a race or people expose themselves to the danger of being weak, no one can tell when they will be reduced to slavery.”

People Long Able Individual Race Conditions Danger Protect Weak Slavery

Book:Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey

Source: Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey

“Frederick Douglas's agenda was an agenda, not for black people to get out of slavery. It was for America to become a better democracy. And it's spilt over for women's rights; it's split over for worker's rights and so forth.”

People America Black Democracy Rights Slavery Workers Agendas Black People Splits Womens Rights Frederick Douglas

Author:Cornel West

“I'm not pessimistic, because poor people tend to bounce back. We've been through worse than this - working people been through worse than this. We've got slavery and Jim Crow. We've got workers with no rights up until `35. We're going to bounce back. We are resilient, resisting people. So, it's not pessimism, but it is blues-like. It's not optimistic. We're just prisoners of hope, that's all.”

People Poor Rights Slavery Workers Optimistic Pessimism Prisoner Poor People Crow Pessimistic Resisting Resilient Bounce Jim Crow

Author:Cornel West

“I've always been interested in history, but they never taught Negro history in the public schools...I don't see how a history of the United States can be written honestly without including the Negro. I didn't [paint] just as a historical thing, but because I believe these things tie up with the Negro today. We don't have a physical slavery, but an economic slavery. If these people, who were so much worse off than the people today, could conquer their slavery, we can certainly do the same thing....I am not a politician. I'm an artist, just trying to do my part to bring this thing about.”

“Now I see why reading was illegal for black people during slavery. I discover that I think in words. The more words I know, the more things I can think about. My vocab and thoughts grow together like the stem and petals of a flower. Reading was illegal because if you limit someone's vocab, you limit their thoughts. They can't even think of freedom because they don't have the language to.”

People Ifs Thinking Knows I Can Together Reading Language Grows Black Flower Limits Slavery Illegal Black People Stem Petals

Author:M. K. Asante

“In any country, regardless of what its laws say, wherever people act upon the idea that the disadvantage of one man is the good of another, there slavery exists. Wherever, in any country the whole people feel that the happiness of all is dependent upon the happiness of the weakest, there freedom exists.”

People Men Feels Ideas Country Whole Law Slavery Dependent One Man Disadvantages

Book:The Booker T. Washington Papers

Source: The Booker T. Washington Papers

“Dictators during the entire history of this planet have used similar techniques. By not letting the people of their country know what conditions existed outside their boundaries, they could get the people to fight to stay in those conditions. It was the old adage: Convince a slave that he's free , and he will fight to maintain his slavery .”

People Knows Country Used Fighting Conditions Planets Slavery Slave Technique Boundaries Convince Dictator Adages

Book:The Jewels of Aptor

Source: The Jewels of Aptor

“There're two people in the world that are not likeable: a master and a slave.”

People World Two Masters Slavery Slave Be A Slave Likeable

Author:Nikki Giovanni

“All too often, as we know from experience, people do not choose life; they do not accept the gospel of life, but let themselves be led by ideologies and ways of thinking that block life, that do not respect life, because they are dictated by selfishness, self-interest, profit, power and pleasure and not by love. ... As a result, the Living God is replaced by fleeting human idols, which offer the intoxication of a flash of freedom, but in the end bring new forms of slavery and death.”

“Human nature is full of riddles; . . . one of those riddles is: how is it that people who have been crushed by the sheer weight of slavery and cast to the bottom of the pit can nevertheless find strength in themselves to rise up and free themselves first in spirit and then in body while those who soar unhampered over the peaks of freedom suddenly lose the taste of freedom, lose the will to defend it, and, hopelessly confused and lost, almost begin to crave slavery?'”

“A nation that will keep people in slavery for 244 years will "thingify" them and make them things. And therefore, they will exploit them and poor people generally economically. And a nation that will exploit economically will have to have foreign investments and everything else, and it will have to use its military might to protect them. All of these problems are tied together. What I'm saying today is that we must go from this convention and say, "America, you must be born again!"”

“Later, a large band of Christians mounted an attack on this native lord, butchering him along with vast numbers of his people and taking all the survivors into slavery, where they duly perished, so that today not a trace remains of what was previously a community with dominion over an area of some thirty leagues.”

People Today Christian Community Numbers Lord Atheism Band Areas Slavery Remains League Thirty Native Survivor Dominion

Author:Bartolome de las Casas

“The [Confederate] Flag is - literally - sewed division. People claim it means different things to different people, but it harkens back to the pro-slavery side of the war.”

People Mean Different War Sides Claims Slavery Different Things Division Flags Different Peoples Confederate Confederate Flag Pro Slavery

Author:Greg Gutfeld

“People-trafficking is modern day slavery. There are more slaves today than there were at the height of the slave trade.”

People Today Modern Slavery Trade Slave Height Modern Day Trafficking Slave Trade Modern Day Slavery

Author:Ross Kemp

“Every time that a people which has long crouched in slavery and ignorance is moved to its lowest depths there appear monsters and heroes, prodigies of crime and prodigies of virtue.”

People Long Virtue Progress Crime Ignorance Hero Slavery Moved Depth Monsters Lowest Prodigies

Book:History of the Girondists: Or, Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution. From Unpublished Sources

Source: History of the Girondists: Or, Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution. From Unpublished Sources

“Cruelty was the devil, and most people were, in one way or another, cruel. Tyranny, suppression, persecution, torture, slavery, war, neglect - all were cruel. The world was acid and sour with hate, fat with greed, yellow with the triumph of the strong and the rich.”

People World Way War Hate Strong Rich Devil Slavery Greed Tyranny Fats Cruelty One Way Triumph Torture Neglect Yellow Persecution Acid Sour Suppression

Book:And No Man's Wit

Source: And No Man's Wit

“My people had used music to soothe slavery's torment or to propitiate God, or to describe the sweetness of love and the distress of lovelessness, but I knew no race could sing and dance its way to freedom.”

People Way Used Freedom Race Music Slavery Distress Sweetness Torment Lovelessness

Book:The Heart of a Woman

Source: The Heart of a Woman

“In America, you can segregate the people, but the problems will travel. From slavery to equal rights, from state suppression of dissent to crime, drugs and unemployment, I can't think of a supposedly Black issue that hasn't wasted the original Black target group and then spread like measles to outlying white experience.”

Source: On call: political essays

“I think most people when you say slavery tend to see a group of anonymous people pulling cotton sacks in great plantation fields, and that is largely true.”

People Thinking Groups Fields Slavery Pulling Cotton Plantations

Author:Alex Haley

“The slave power dares anything, and it can be conquered only by the united masses of the people. From Congress to the people, I appeal.”

People United Mass Slavery Slave Congress Dare Appeals

Book:American slavery: repr. of an article [by N.W. Senior, entitled Slavery in the United States] on 'Uncle Tom's cabin' [by H.E.B. Stowe] and of mr. Sumner's speech of the 19th and 20th of May, 1856. With a notice of the events which followed that speech

Source: American slavery: repr. of an article [by N.W. Senior, entitled Slavery in the United States] on 'Uncle Tom's cabin' [by H.E.B. Stowe] and of mr. Sumner's speech of the 19th and 20th of May, 1856. With a notice of the events which followed that speech

“Although all men are born free, slavery has been the general lot of the human race. Ignorant--they have been cheated; asleep--they have been surprised; divided--the yoke has been forced upon them. But what is the lesson...? The people ought to be enlightened, to be awakened, to be united, that after establishing a government they should watch over it.... It is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently free.”

People Men Should Humans Wells Has Beens Government Born United Race Watches Ought Lessons Slavery Ignorant Human Race Enlightened Over It Divided Awakened Cheated Yoke Born Free

Author:James Madison

“Captive people have a need for song.”

People Needs Song Singing Slavery Captives

Author:Michelle Cliff

“Good kings are slaves, and their people are free.”

People Kings Slavery Slave Good Kings

Author:Marie Leszczynska

“We have the potential to help people out of poverty, out of disease, out of slavery and out of conflict. Too often we turn the other way because we think there's nothing we can do.”

People Thinking Way Helping Turns Can Do Poverty Conflict Disease Slavery

Author:Alicia Keys

“Maybe it's the remnants of my religious upbringing, but I do try and insert a sense of social justice into the work. For instance, to me, Mansfield Park is a story about servitude and slavery. Other people may have a problem with that, but that's how I read the book and so that's how I shot the movie.”

People Trying May Book Stories Problem Social Religious Justice Shots Social Justice Slavery Instance Parks Upbringing Servitude Remnants Insert Mansfield Park

Author:Patricia Rozema

“Movements are not radical. Movements are the American way. A small group of abolitionists writing and speaking eventually led to the end of slavery. A few stirred-up women brought about women's voting. The Populist movement, the Progressive movement, the anti-Vietnam War movement, the women's movement - the examples go on and on of 'little people' getting together and telling the truth about their lives. They made our government act.”

“Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor was he deceived in his expectation, that the senate and people would submit to slavery, provided they were respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their ancient freedom.”

People Stills Names History Mankind Expectations Slavery Ancient Enjoyed Sensible Senate Submit Assured Deceived Roman Empire Augustus

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“Majorities can be wrong, majorities can overrule rights of minorities. If majorities ruled, we could still have slavery. 80% of the population once enslaved 20% of the population. While run by majority rule that is ok. That is very flawed notion of what democracy is. Democracy has to take into account several things - proportionate requirements of people, not just needs of the majority, but also needs of the minority. Majority, especially in societies where the media manipulates public opinion, can be totally wrong and evil. People have to act according to conscience and not by majority vote.”

“Slavery, you know, is nothing else than the unwilling labor of many. Therefore to get rid of slavery it is necessary that people should not wish to profit by the forced labor of others and should consider it a sin and a shame. But they go and abolish the external form of slavery and arrange so that one can no longer buy and sell slaves, and they imagine and assure themselves that slavery no longer exists, and do not see or wish to see that it does, because people still want and consider it good and right to exploit the labor of others.”

People Knows Want Should Doe Stills Form Wish Sin Imagine Labor Shame Slavery Sells Slave Profit Exploits Unwilling Abolish

Author:Leo Tolstoy

“The flow of people into the United States into slavery, it follows the other types of immigration into the United States, so people who are trying to build new lives, trying to build a better life.”

People Trying States United United States Type Flow Slavery Immigration New Life Better Life

Author:Kevin Bales

“It is over one hundred years since the abolition of slavery. The Negro people in the United States have taken plenty and they have reached a stage where they have decided that they are not going to take any more.”

People Years States United United States Taken Stage Hundred Decided Slavery Plenty Abolition Abolition Of Slavery

Author:C. L. R. James

“We are a free people; and now you have planted in our country the title deeds of our future slavery. You are neither god nor demon; who are you, then, to make slaves? Orou! You understand the language of these men, tell us all, as you have told me, what they have written on this sheet of metal: This country is ours. This country yours? And why? Because you have walked thereon? If a Tahitian landed one day on your shores, and scratched on one of your rocks or on the bark of your trees: This country belongs to the people of Tahiti - what would you think?”

People Ifs Thinking Men Country Language Written Tree Atheism Rocks One Day Slavery Slave Deeds Positive Atheism Our Country Titles Demon Shore Our Future Metals Sheets Bark Tahiti

Author:Denis Diderot

“When the first people started to argue against slavery, for example, this was a new idea. If you crowd-source, you'd never come up with this. And so the - exactly the kind of progress we've made couldn't be made if we depend it on crowd-sourcing.”

People Ifs Firsts Kind Made Ideas Progress Example Source Depends Slavery Come Up Crowds Arguing New Ideas

Author:Rebecca Goldstein

“Black people in America have come from slavery to other forms of being oppressed and there are some things that come with that - some pain and anger that come with that and we as black people have to deal with it to heal that. White people have to understand it and have some compassion toward it.”

People Pain America Form Black White Deals Compassion Slavery Heal Black People Oppressed

Author:Common

“It's therapy. [people] say true healing requires honest confrontation, and that can be seen on a macro scale with America and the things that have been swept under the rug, whether it be with the native Americans or slavery, or whatever holocaust that's happened on this soil.”

People Has Beens America Healing Happened Honest Slavery Scales Therapy Soil Native Holocaust Native American Confrontation Macro

Author:Nate Parker

“This is beautiful indeed; the colored people have given this to the head of the government, and that government once sanctioned laws that would not permit its people to learn enough to enable them to read this book.”

People Book Enough Government Beautiful Law Reading Given Color Slavery Permit Book Reading

Book:Narrative of Sojourner Truth

Source: Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“... some of my people could have been left [in Africa] and are living there. And I can't understand them and they don't know me and I don't know them because all we had was taken away from us. And I became kind of angry; I felt the anger of why this had to happen to us. We were so stripped and robbed of our background, we wind up with nothing.”

People Knows Kind Has Beens I Can Happens Left Felt Taken Wind Slavery Angry Backgrounds Oppression Know Me Could Have Been

Author:Fannie Lou Hamer

“I think that hip-hop should be spelled with a capital "H," and as one word. It's the name of our black people culture, and it's the name of our identity and consciousness. I think hip-hop is not a product, but a culture. I think rap is a product, but when hip-hop becomes a product, that's slavery, because you're talking about people's souls. To me, that's the biggest problem.”

People Thinking Should Soul Problem Culture Names Black Consciousness Talking Identity Products Slavery Hip Hop Rap Hips Hops Black People One Word

Author:KRS-One

“To dine, drink champagne, raise a racket and make speeches about the people's consciousness, the people's conscience, freedom andso forth while servants in tails are scurrying around your table, just like serfs, and out in the severe cold on the street await coachmen--this is the same as lying to the holy spirit.”

People Spirit Lying Consciousness Streets Cold Drink Holy Speech Conscience Raises Tables Slavery Servant Holy Spirit Hypocrisy Tails Severe Champagne Racket Dine Serfs

Author:Anton Chekhov

“Historian Larry Hise notes in his book Pro-Slavery that ministers 'wrote almost half of all defenses of slavery published in America.' He listed 275 men of the cloth who used the Bible to prove that white people were entitled to own black people as work animals.”

Source: Holy horrors: an illustrated history of religious murder and madness

“But, slavery is good for some people! ! ! As a good thing, slavery is strikingly peculiar, in this, that it is the only good thing which no man ever seeks the good of, for himself.”

People Men Slavery Good Things Peculiar

Book:Lincoln: Political Writings and Speeches

Source: Lincoln: Political Writings and Speeches

“I pity from the bottom of my heart any nation or body of people that is so unfortunate as to get entangled in the net of slavery.”

People Heart Body Nations My Heart Slavery Bottom Pity Unfortunate

Book:Up from Slavery: Top Biography

Source: Up from Slavery: Top Biography

“When people think of slavery, they think of an era from the distant past. Grainy photographs from Civil War times. And yet it goes on.”

People Thinking War Past Goes On Slavery Photograph Eras Civil War War Time

Author:Lisa Kristine

“Around the world, human traffickers trick many people into slavery by false promises of good jobs or good education, only to find themselves forced to work without pay, under the threat of violence.”

People World Humans Jobs Pay Violence Promise Slavery Threat Tricks Around The World Good Job Good Education False Promises

Author:Lisa Kristine

“To have one's race brutally treated for so many years, even after the end of slavery and segregation, people are going to rise up with violence to attain what they believe is rightfully theirs. The most important thing at this time is raising the awareness of everyone; people need to be educated everywhere about all aspects of racism and how it affects people still today.”

People Needs Years Believe Stills Important Ends Today Race Violence Awareness Racism Aspect Slavery Important Things Treated Educated Segregation

Author:Assata Shakur

“People are really beginning to see the mechanisms of imperialism. When colonialism existed people could see colonialism. When racial segregation existed in its apartheid form, people could see the "whites only" signs. But it's much more difficult to see the structures of neo-imperialism, neo-colonialism, neo-slavery.”

People Form Difficult Slavery Structure Mechanism Colonialism Imperialism Segregation Apartheid Racial Segregation

Author:Assata Shakur

“Slavery was incredibly prosperous for some people, at that time. It was not a bad business plan, but it was terrible and inhumane. But as a business it worked.”

People Plans Terrible Slavery Prosperous Business Plan Inhumane Bad Business

Author:Chuck D

“Black people have slavery. And white people have our own thing-stuff we went though that hurt us that we have to cope with. Like when they took our slaves away. That was really hard for us. So it's pretty even.”

People Hard Funny Stuff Black Hurt White Comedy Slavery Slave Black People

Author:Louis C. K.

“If any religion allows the persecution of the people of different faiths, if any religion keeps women in slavery, if any religion keeps people in ignorance, then I can't accept that religion.”

People Ifs I Can Different Accepting Atheism Ignorance Slavery Persecution Different Faiths

Author:Taslima Nasrin