Henry Louis Gates Jr. Quotes

So few people vote these days, and I think it's partly because they don't feel like the institution really means anything to them. If you want them to vote, give them opportunities to do something else other than vote, to help.

It takes ground activity to stimulate that Black vote.

A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls.

The larger percentage of people you have registered, the larger percentage of people you will have voting.

One of the things about the electoral system in the United States, in general, is that it is very susceptible to class. In poorer neighborhoods you are going to have a lower turnout. This country is very much a middle-class country. When you're talking about poor or working-class people, there are not many vehicles for mobilizing them.

It is the duty of governments to create a pro-voter environment that encourages participation, but it is also the responsibility of citizens to make their voices heard.

If you don't register to vote, politicians don't really care about you: politicians aren't really caring about what you have to say, what you have to do, anything.

If people of colour do not exercise their democratic right to vote, they will remain an invisible, voiceless, and largely ignored part of the electorate.

We want to get people of color out to vote, because their vote matters. Every politician tries to capture it. But it's More Than a Vote because we want to come up with what's our ask, and hold these politicians' feet to the fire to make real change.

We have to continue to raise awareness as the Voting Rights Caucus... make sure people call into their state legislators. Let us know that they've decided they weren't going to vote because they heard it was a hassle.

One of the areas that many of us, including the Women's March organizers, are focusing on is starting mass voter registration and voter engagement.

Registering people to vote is not partisan activity.

We've got 50 percent voter turnout for presidential elections. That's appalling. We can do so much better.

Black Fergusonians have shown that they will vote when they have something to vote for and know that their vote will count. Seventy-six percent of them turned out in November 2012, when Missouri was a key swing state for Barack Obama's reelection.

For our white members, voting is something they have done for hundreds of years. But for us, it is not such a traumatic thing, because we have never participated in an election.

To let the people know there was life beyond Shirley Dean, we decided to focus on voter registration; each day I set up my card table somewhere in the district, signed people up, and passed out noses.

In last year's local elections in Manchester a third of those who voted did so by post. It's not just that people are choosing to get postal votes, but having one makes it much more likely that they'll vote.

A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls.

Surely, if we can land a spaceship on Mars, we can certainly put a voter ID card in the hand of every eligible voter.

If you are a representative, and poor people don’t vote, you’re not going to pay particular attention to the needs of the poor.

We'll get out the [black] vote, but we need the white vote to win.

My job is to reach out to 8 million people whether they voted for me or not.

They hustled the indifferent to the booths; they lent shawls and held babies; they carried the sick and dying to the polls on mattresses—and they won. May black shame fall upon the individual or the party who, having the trust of these women, ever betrays it.

Low turnout in off-year races is always a challenge for Democrats. Many of our voters require information and must be contacted way ahead of Election Day - and reminded of what's at stake.

For too many years, those eligible to vote in primary or general elections did not bother to do so. Those sensible centrists who do not go to rallies but care deeply about our country effectively silenced their own voices. That sent the message to incumbents that they were either doing the right thing or that we just did not care.