Wangari Maathai Quotes

Maybe we ought to have a world in which things are divided between people kind of fairly.

The essence of good government is trust.

How many men ever went to a barbecue and would let one man take off the table what's intended for 9/10th of the people to eat? The only way you'll ever be able to feed the balance of the people is to make that man come back and bring back some of that grub that he ain't got no business with!

You shouldn't go around the world behaving ruthlessly when you don't have to. Sometimes you do have to. There is only so much pie to go around. If you're going to take more than your fair share of pie, as socialists would look at it, then someone else is not getting his. That means you've got to take it away from them.

We must weed out corruption and build a strong system of justice that the people can trust.

Love and trust and justice, concern for the poor, that's being pushed to the margins, and you can see it.

We should govern our actions by assuming that people are more good than bad. Whereas, most of our social policies dictate that people are more bad than good. That you know if you do something, it'll be seized by the rich to exploit the poor.

Justice often means taking power from some who have it and giving it to some who do not.

Global markets are the best way to allocate resources efficiently but not to do it fairly.

It's really important to me that the public have confidence in their criminal justice system. We don't operate very well if the public doesn't trust us.

Trusting that you will some time or other do me greater justice than you can do now.

If every man took only what was sufficient for his needs, leaving the rest to those in want, there would be no rich and no poor.

Give everyone a chance to have a piece of the pie. If the pie's not big enough, make a bigger pie.

Social justice rests on the hate towards those that enjoy a comfortable position, namely, upon envy.

Start trying to work out who deserves what, and before long you'll spend the rest of your days weeping for each and every person in the world.

A distribution is just if it arises from another just distribution by legitimate means.

The world has plenty of room, riches, money and beauty ... Let us begin by dividing it more fairly.

A way has to be found to enable everyone to benefit from the fruits of the earth, and not simply to close the gap between the affluent and those who must be satisfied with the crumbs falling from the table, but above all to satisfy the demands of justice, fairness and respect for every human being.

The world isn't fair, but as long as it's tilting in my direction, I find that there's a natural cap to my righteous indignation.

Do we operate under a system of equal justice under law? Or is there one system for the average citizen and another for the high and mighty?

In the weeks and months ahead, my task is to show I have the new ideas, the vision and the experience to earn the trust of the British people.

What reason is there that he which laboreth much, and, sparing the fruits of his labor, consumeth little, should be more charged than he that, living idly, getteth little and spendeth all he gets, seeing the one hath no more protection from the commonwealth than the other?

The first condition of nonviolence is justice all round, in every department of life.

It will be good for us in the long run, and I mean there are, you know, six and a half billion people in this world. And it's great for 300 million to keep enjoying more and more property, but I think it's terrific if, you know, the remainder do.

We can not expect to breed respect for law and order among people who do not share the fruits of our freedom.