Hillary Clinton Quotes


On some campuses, change is effected through nonviolent or even violent means.


Citations

Clinton, Hillary. "Student Commencement Speech." Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, 31 May 1969.

Related Quotes

His strategy was to fill the jails of Birmingham, and asked the young people to help. The next days saw virtually all the Birmingham high school students our of school and in the streets protesting which was then against the un-Constitutional laws of Birmingham and Alabama. The students were arrested by the droves and the white authorities, believing that they were being firm against “radical lawbreakers”, fell into the trap, and became a travesty to most of the country and the rest of the world and the hundreds of jailed students beaten and assaulted raised the consciousness of whites as well as Blacks.


This quotation is used by the moderate Egyptians and other moderate Arab leaders as well as Israelis and other experts in combating Islamic Fundamentalism to illustrate the thinking process of the Muslim fundamentalist terrorist leader. They are more than willing to sacrifice those they lead (though rarely themselves) if they think that something is to be gained. But if there is nothing to be gained, their “moral” responsibility requires not “wasting” their followers’ lives. Therefore, the way these experts believe they should deal with the radicals is to face them with overwhelming force (a variant of the Powell Doctrine) and never concede anything or let them gain anything from violence. A single concession makes the terrorism, sacrifice and violence worthwhile, but if there is no gain, the leader has wasted the lives of his followers and is less likely to initiate another attack.


This speech is often referred to as the “Ballot or the Bullet” speech. It was the first time that Malcolm X used the “Ballot or the Bullet”. He was not the first African American to use the “Ballot or the Bullet” phrase. See {624102} for a use over 100 years ago. However, he was really arguing to allow Blacks to vote in the South where it was almost impossible at the time. There was no Voting Rights Act at that time and it was his actions that helped pass one shortly thereafter.


Half a century later some in the Muslim world were justifying terrorism, violence and intimidation on the grounds of desperation of the unique circumstances Islam as in and the attack Islam was under. However, many scholars use this quotation to illustrate that extra legal means and violence has been a Muslim tactic. It actually goes back to the beginning of Islam. It was ironic that Ali Kahn, after supporting extra-legal and violent means of achieving political objectives was himself the victim when he was assassinated in 1951.


He advocated no cooperation with the British Colonial Administration which depended on Indian officials, administrators, clerks and other workers. The boycott strategy never worked in this case, but civil disobedience did. Boycott did work against the apartheid regime in South Africa a half century later however.


Rouhani insists that “Death to America” does not have its literal meaning in the minds of Iranians. He asserts that it means that the United States should be stopped from interfering with the internal affairs of Iran and other countries. Before the Iranian Revolution the track record of the U. S. was extensive in overtly and covertly meddling in Iran, including the covert toppling of a democratically elected President. He did not offer any explanation as to why the Iranians don’t simply have a chant of slogan that says “Stop American Meddling”.


Hillary Clinton
Hillary Clinton
  • Born: October 26, 1947
  • Nationality: American
  • Profession: Politician

Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is an American politician, diplomat, lawyer, writer, and public speaker who served as the 67th United States secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, as a United States senator from New York from 2001 to 2009, and as First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Clinton became the first woman to be nominated for president of the United States by a major political party when she won the Democratic Party nomination in 2016. She was the first woman to win the popular vote in an American presidential election; however, she failed to win the Electoral College.