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Voting Rights Quotes

Browse 95 quotes about Voting Rights.

Voting Rights Quotes

“In the course of our conversation, I learned that there were many cities in Central Asia where dark men and women are in control of the government. And I thought about Mississippi where more than half of the population is Negro, but one never hears of a colored person in the government. In fact, in the state Negroes cannot even vote. And you will never meet them riding in the sleeping car.”

GovernmentRacismAsiaAfrican AmericansPoliticiansBlacksSegregationRace RelationsMississippiVoting Rights
Book:Good Morning, Revolution: Uncollected Social Protest Writings
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“It was rather a choice between suffrage and slavery, after endless blood and gold had flowed to sweep human bondage away. Not a single Southern legislature stood ready to admit a Negro, under any conditions, to the polls; not a single Southern legislature believed free Negro labor was possible without a system of restrictions that took all its freedom away; there was scarcely a white man in the South who did not honestly regard Emancipation as a crime, and its practical nullification as a duty. In such a situation, the granting of the ballot to the black man was a necessity, the very least a guilty nation could grant a wronged race, and the only method of compelling the South to accept the results of the war. Thus Negro suffrage ended a civil war by beginning a race feud. And some felt gratitude toward the race thus sacrificed in its swaddling clothes on the altar of national integrity; and some felt and feel only indifference and contempt.”

SlaverySouthVotingAfrican AmericansBlacksRace RelationsReconstructionSuffrageVoting Rights
Book:The Souls of Black Folk
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“A subtle but effective way of encouraging an irregular voter is by slightly altering your vocabulary when you ask questions. For reasons that are unclear, people’s internal identity is only loosely connected to their actions—until they’re reminded of the discrepancy between the two. Use that to your advantage by emphasizing the identity of being a voter rather than the act of voting.”

PoliticsDemocracyVotingElectionsMeritocracyVoting RightsVoter
Book:The Secret of Greatness
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“Contrary to unwritten political law of abuse, Civilians are not the doormats of democracy. Civilians are the doors, civilians are the buildings, Civilians are the whole of the social anatomy.”

Civil RightsDemocratic SocietyCivic DutyCorruption QuotesVoting RightsCitizens QuotesPolitical PoetryCrooked PoliticiansPolitics And PoliticiansDemocratic Poem
Book:Esperanza Impossible: 100 Sonnets of Ethics, Engineering & Existence
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“The vote is the emblem of your equality, women of America, the guaranty of your liberty. That vote of yours has cost millions of dollars and the lives of thousands of women. Women have suffered agony of soul which you never can comprehend, that you and your daughters might inherit political freedom. That vote has been costly. Prize it! The vote is a power, a weapon of offense and defense, a prayer. Use it intelligently, conscientiously, prayerfully. Progress is calling to you to make no pause. Act!”

SuffrageVoting Rights
Author:Carrie Catt
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“When it comes to our democracy, and who we determine to have the right to vote--our most sacred of rights--patience is no virtue. We must never be patient when someone else's rights are in the balance. We cannot wait on laws, or elected officials, or anyone else. The only virtue when it comes to the right to vote is impatience.”

DemocracyVotingProtestAfrican AmericansBlacksImpatienceVoting RightsVoter Suppression
Book:Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019
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“If you're on benefits you shouldn't get to vote. You’re making no contribution to society, so why should you have a say in how it’s run? If you’re retired, of course you vote. You’ve made your contributions. If you’re a stay-at-home mum, then likewise you get to vote. And if ill or invalided in some way, the same. But if you’re fit and healthy and capable of mending a fence or stacking shelves, and you’re not doing either of those things, then you don’t get to vote. I don’t want someone who’s too lazy to get a job making decisions on how this country should be run.”

BenefitsVoteWelfareVoting RightsVoters And VotingVoting Rights ActWelfare BenefitsWelfare MindsetVoting Justice
Book:100 Common Sense Policies to make BRITAIN GREAT again
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“Fixing our democracy is the equivalent of repairing a crack in your home's foundation. It's expensive and time consuming. It doesn't boost your curb appeal. But it's the only way to make every other alteration last.”

DemocracyVoting Rights
Book:Democracy in One Book or Less: How It Works, Why It Doesn’t, and Why Fixing It Is Easier Than You Think
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“Allow more people to vote, and more people who support voting rights will get elected. The more successfully we defend our republic, the easier our republic becomes to defend. There are ideas that benefit from years or even decades of nitpicky polish. Fixing our country's foundation is not one of them.”

DemocracyVoting Rights
Book:Democracy in One Book or Less: How It Works, Why It Doesn’t, and Why Fixing It Is Easier Than You Think
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“Voting rights are the most basic tenet of our democracy, and the bare minimum one should expect from the government. Our presidents can send our neighbors to war. Local elected officials decide the mundane questions of trash pickup and the weightier issues of hospital closures. At every level of our lives in this republic, we choose men and women to speak for us, yes, but also to determine the direction of our daily lives. And all it takes is a teachers’ strike or a government shutdown to remind us how vital elections can be to the daily rhythms of life.”

DemocracyDaily LifeElectionsVoting Rights
Book:Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America
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“If I am asked, What do you propose to substitute for universal suffrage? Practically, What have you to recommend? I answer at once, Nothing. The whole current of thought and feeling, the whole stream of human affairs, is setting with irresistible force in that direction. The old ways of living, many of which were just as bad in their time as any of our devices can be in ours, are breaking down all over Europe, and are floating this way and that like haycocks in a flood. Nor do I see why any wise man should expend much thought or trouble on trying to save their wrecks. The waters are out and no human force can turn them back, but I do not see why as we go with the stream we need sing Hallelujah to the river god.”

LibertyDemocracySuffrageVoting Rights
Author:James Fitzjames Stephen
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