Katori Hall Quotes

All Americans owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. King for his bravery and commitment to civil rights and nonviolence that changed this nation - and world - for the better.

I think all of us thought that by the '70s, at the latest the '80s, all the world's problems would be solved and everyone would be getting along fine. And instead we saw that Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated that year, Robert F. Kennedy died. We saw that it was going to be a lot more difficult than I think we had thought.

Memphis is the place where rock was born and Martin Luther King, Jr., was killed. It's full of contradictions, abject poverty, and riches that only music can provide.

I remember the day tDr. King died. I wasn't angry at the beginning. It was like something very personal in my life had been touched and finished.

Dr. King gave his life to peace and justice and reconciliation between people, black and white, rich and poor, and he was a great hero for not only people who were oppressed in our country but for people who believed in justice both here and around the world.

Yes, I think it's really important to acknowledge that Dr. King, precisely at the moment of his assassination, was re-conceptualizing the civil rights movement and moving toward a sort of coalitional relationship with the trade union movement.

The saddest face I ever saw on Martin Luther King was at the funeral of the four little girls slain in Birmingham, Alabama.

For a black student to work in southwest Mississippi for example - or in the Delta in 1960, 1961, 1962 - was high-risk work.

In 1968, the sanitation workers of Memphis tried to form a union. The city resisted. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. came to support them. That was where he lost his life.

When I was born here in Gulfport in 1966, my parents' interracial marriage was still illegal, and it was very hard to drive around town with my parents, to be out in public with my parents.

Obama was elected in a flourish of promise that many in the African-American community believed would help not only to symbolize African-American progress since the Civil War and Civil Rights Acts but that his presidency would result in doors opening in the halls of power as had never been seen before by black America.

These young people have to know that Dr. King and others made it possible for them to do their Hip Hopping.

Mr. President, the Black masses are restless and we are going to march on Washington.

What we fly today is not an enduring symbol of our heritage, but the fighting flag of those who wanted to preserve a segregated South.

I flatly deny that it is a civil right for a white man to marry a black woman or for a black man to marry a white woman.

Recent events in Alabama, involving murder, savage brutality, and violence by local police [against civil rights protesters] ... have so aroused the nation as to make action by this Congress necessary and speedy.

The Southern institution of racial segregation or racial separation was the correct, self-evident truth which arose from the chaos and confusion of the Reconstruction period. Separation promotes racial harmony. It permits each race to follow its own pursuits, and its own civilization. Segregation is not discrimination

It’s time we faced facts. Southern people just don’t like Black people.

The murder, savage brutality, and violence perpetrated by Alabama lawmen have so aroused the nation as to make action by the Congress necessary and speedy.

The assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. made me very, very sad, and I mourned and I cried like many of our citizens did.

When we started making 'Selma,' the Black Lives Matter movement didn't exist. The parallels between Martin Luther King staging these marches, suffering police brutality... we weren't even aware when making the film that these sorts of things would start to happen again in 2015.

Martin Luther King Jr. could have argued that separate water fountains were too expensive, a waste of money. He would have been right about that. But cost was beside the point.

I do remember the numbers runners, I do remember the poverty and bread lines. Harlem stays with you forever.

I was in a number of school plays, one in particular, when I was 13 or 14, entitled 'Illusions.' It was put together by one of the teachers, and was about famous historical figures. I had to do the Martin Luther King 'I have a dream' speech, and some black women in the audience were clapping and crying and whooping.

I think Dr. King would be pleased to see the number of elected officials of color - African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and progressive whites.