Heather Cox Richardson Quotes

In the history of the world, slavery has been and still is the normal condition of most men; all the great accumulations of property have been the result of slavery, and civilization was the result of property…. art, literature, science, architecture, beautiful women, and gentlemen of leisure all depend upon the forced labor of masses of ignorant men whom to make free would be a social crime.

The blunting effects of slavery upon the slaveholder's moral perceptions are known and conceded the world over; and a privileged class, an aristocracy, is but a band of slaveholders under another name.

Slavery is the first step towards civilization. In order to develop it is necessary that things should be much better for some and much worse for others, then those who are better off can develop at the expense of others.

The trouble with our people is as soon as they got out of slavery they didn't want to give the white man nothing else. But the fact is, you got to give em something. Either your money, your land, your woman or your ass.

It is impossible for white men to live with the coloured races without adopting a conviction that…they have the right to command the services of the less civilized.

The worker is always in the sun while the landowner is always in the shade.

Is the great working class oppressed? Yes, undoubtedly it is. God has intended the great to be great and the little to be little.

The defeats and victories for the people at the top aren't defeats and victories for the people at the bottom.

The South came to adopt a social philosophy wonderfully like that of Germany …. Inequality became the natural order; slavery was accepted as a blessing from heaven; and masters of plantations became the supermen from whom ideas and good reasoning were confidently expected.

There is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I, as much as any other man, am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.

Southern men declare that their slaves are better off than hired laborers amongst us. How little they know, whereof they speak! There is no permanent class of hired laborers amongst us.

In all social systems there must be a class to do the menial duties, to perform the drudgery of life. That is, a class requiring but a low order of intellect and but little skill. Its requisites are vigor, docility, fidelity. Such a class you must have, or you would not have that other class which leads progress, civilization, and refinement.

The Declaration of Independence was written by white men for white men.

… the work of one Negro was worth more than that of four Indians.

I’ll tell you what’s at the bottom of it. If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.

In America, everybody is, but some are more than others.

Hear me people: We have now to deal with another race - small and feeble when our fathers first met them, but now great and overbearing. Strangely enough they have a mind to till the soil and the love of possession is a disease with them. These people have made many rules that the rich may break but the poor may not. They take their tithes from the poor and weak to support the rich and those who rule.

At the moment we have a ruling class that has one law and the people the other.

One of the most considerable advantages the great have over their inferiors is to have servants as good as themselves.

To reduce this claim of slavery to an absurdity, it is only necessary to add that there are only two states in which slaves are a majority, and not one in which the slaveholders are not a very disproportionate minority.

Simple peck-order bullying is only the beginning of the kind of hierarchical behavior that can lead to racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, classism, and all the other 'isms' that cause so much suffering in the world.

I'm the result of upbringing, class, race, gender, social prejudices, and economics. So I'm a victim again. A result.

Colour is not the issue in America; class is.

The value systems of those with access to power and of those far removed from such access cannot be the same. The viewpoint of the privileged is unlike that of the underprivileged.

They cannot divide us by saying that you're middle class or you're lower class.