Marquis de Lafayette Quotes

One man’s right is every man’s right.

Human Rights

Freedom is not the sole prerogative of a chosen few, but the universal right of all God's children.

Let us take care of our rights and we therein take care of our prosperity. Slavery is ever preceded by sleep

The quest for freedom, dignity, and the rights of man will never end.

A right is not what someone gives you; it's what no one can take from you.

All of our freedoms – All of the time.

We are not fighting for integration, nor are we fighting for separation. We are fighting for recognition as human beings. We are fighting for human rights.

Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others. It does not allow that the sacrifices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advantages enjoyed by many. Therefore in a just society the liberties of equal citizenship are taken as settled; the rights secured by justice are not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests.

The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class. It is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity.

Human rights must work to uplift human dignity.

All men are created equal.

The struggle for human rights is at its core a struggle for human dignity.

In giving rights to others which belong to them, we give rights to ourselves and to our country

Human rights are fundamental rights, they are the minimum, the very least we demand. Too often, they become the goal itself. What should be the minimum becomes the maximum - all we are supposed to expect - but human rights aren't enough. The goal is, and must always be, justice.

I have one abiding religion-human liberty.

Liberty, equality - bad principles! The only true principle for humanity is justice; and justice to the feeble is protection and kindness.

The rights of man as the foundation of just Government had been long understood but the superstructures projected had been sadly defective

Happy, thrice happy shall they be pronounced hereafter, who have contributed any thing, who have performed the meanest office in erecting this stupendous fabrick of Freedom and Empire on the broad basis of Independency; who have assisted in protecting the rights of humane nature and establishing an Asylum for the poor and oppressed of all nations and religions.

I insist that people - wherever they live - have their rights and they must be able to fight for them.

I am not truly free if I am taking away someone else's freedom, just as surely as I am not free when my freedom is taken from me. The oppressed and the oppressor alike are robbed of their humanity.

The idea of "human rights," for example - sometimes it bothers me. Not in itself, but because the concept of human rights has replaced the much grander idea of justice.

The common goal of 22 million Afro-Americans is respect as human beings, the God-given right to be a human being. Our common goal is to obtain the human rights America has been denying us. We can never get civil rights in America until our human rights are first restored. We will never be recognized as citizens there until we are first recognized as humans.

So on this Human Rights Day, let us rededicate ourselves to the advancement of human rights and freedoms for all, and pledge always to live by the ideals we promote to the world.