Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

Social equity is based on justice; politics change on the opinion of the time. The black man's skin will be a mark of social inferiority so long as white men are conceited, ignorant, unjust, and prejudiced. You cannot legislate these qualities out of the white - you must steal them out by teaching, illustration, and example.

During the 60's, I was, in fact, very concerned about the civil rights movement.

It's hard to say when or if we will actually arrive at that place called 'post-racial', or, better yet, post-racism.

It is now time to mobilize, before it is too late, against the creeping legitimacy of racism in our society.

If every Negro said "I'm nonviolent," white folks would love it. But if we had to fight Russia and we said we're nonviolent and don't believe in killing nobody, we'd be hauled off to a concentration camp.

Racial preferences are dead. All that is required now is to give them a decent and honorable burial.

We suspect that 25 years from now the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary.

On the question of racial discrimination, the Addis Ababa Conference taught, to those who will learn, this further lesson:, That until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned:, That until there are no longer first-class and second class citizens of any nation; That until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes;, That until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race; That until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion, to be pursued but never attained;, And until the ignoble and unhappy regimes that hold our brothers in Angola, in Mozambique and in South Africa in subhuman bondage have been toppled and destroyed; Until bigotry and prejudice and malicious and inhuman self-interest have been replaced by understanding and tolerance and good-will;, Until all Africans stand and speak as free beings, equal in the eyes of all men, as they are in the eyes of Heaven; Until that day, the African continent will not know peace.

Racism was once just racism, a terrible bigotry that people nevertheless learned to live with, if not as a necessary evil then as an inevitable one. But the civil-rights movement, along with independence movements around the world, changed that.

To abandon affirmative action is to say there is nothing more to be done about discrimination.

Racism doesn't go overnight. It's over a period of time and education.

I'll stop talking about race when people stop being racist.

If a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy. And what America is trying to do is pass laws to force whites to pretend that they want Negroes into their schools or into - in their places of employment.

If you truly believe in the brotherhood of man, then you must believe that blacks are just as capable of being racists as whites are.

The Civil Rights movement should thank God for Bull Connor. He's helped it as much as Abraham Lincoln.

That was exciting to be able to comment on civil rights. I mean, the civil rights movement that young people don't know about today, but Martin Luther King was considered by the establishment press in the early years of the sit-in movement as a dangerous man, and he was the equivalent at that time as Malcolm X. And he was told to stop his demonstrations; they were against the law and all of that. Now that he's sainted and sanctified we've forgotten.

It's not exactly courageous to be an anti-racist these days; a hundred years ago, it was.

If whites would vote their economic interests, not their racial fears, we the people who have the most need for change have the power to bring about that change nonviolently.

I don't think my films are going to get rid of racism or prejudice. I think the best thing my films can do is provoke discussion.

Racism is cruel and unjust. It cuts deep and lingers long in individual and community memories. And it is not a thing of the past....We all have a duty to do what we can to turn this around.

Protesting the color of a man's skin is not a worthy protest.

Martin Luther King has made the Negro in America unnatural.

A decade passed between King's assassination and my birth, but the older I get, the more acutely aware I become that 10 years is nothing.

There is no easy way to create a world where men and women can live together... But if such a world is created in our lifetime, it will be done by rejecting the racism, materialism, and violence that has characterized Western civilization and especially by working toward a world of brotherhood, cooperation, and peace.

I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.