Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

Nonviolent resistance makes it possible for the Negro to remain in the South and struggle for his rights. The Negro's problem will not be solved by running away.

By nonviolent resistance, the Negro can also enlist all men of good will in his struggle for equality.

There is a more excellent way, of love and nonviolent protest.

I cannot make myself believe that God wanted me to hate. I'm tired of violence, I've seen too much of it. I've seen such hate on the faces of too many sheriffs in the South. And I'm not going to let my oppressor dictate to me what method I must use. Our oppressors have used violence. Our oppressors have used hatred. Our oppressors have used rifles and guns. I'm not going to stoop down to their level. I want to rise to a higher level. We have a power that can't be found in Molotov cocktails.

But nonviolence was never for the oppressor; it was for the oppressed.

The point of nonviolence is to build a floor, a strong new floor, beneath which we can no longer sink. A platform which stands a few feet above napalm, torture, exploitation, poison gas, A and H bombs, the works. Give man a decent place to stand.

One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty.

For a satyagrahi brigade only those are eligible who believe in ahimsa and satya.

Civil disobedience is the only nonviolent escape from the soul-destroying heat of violence.

I think if people really read Martin Luther King, Jr., then they would begin to understand what he really represented. The philosophy that he developed, of course, he was greatly influenced by Gandhi and Jesus Christ.

I don't favor violence. If we could bring about recognition and respect of our people by peaceful means, well and good. Everybody would like to reach his objectives peacefully. But I'm also a realist. The only people in this country who are asked to be nonviolent are black people.

Do not resist the evil-doer and take no part in doing so, either in the violent deeds of the administration, in the law courts, the collection of taxes, or above all in soldiering, and no one in the world will be able to enslave you.

The Indian government has managed to turn the concept of nonviolence on its head. Nonviolent resistance and nonviolent governance. Unlike, say, China or Turkey or Indonesia, India doesn't mow down its people. It doesn't kill people who are refusing to move. It just waits it out. It continues to do what it has to do and ignores the consequences.

The power of nonviolent resistance can only come from honest working of the constructive programme.

As Martin Luther King said, "Passively to participate in an unjust system is to accept that system and to participate in its evil."

My interest in India's freedom will cease if she adopts violent means, for their fruit will not be freedom but slavery in disguise.

We live in a world where people are fearful of extremism, but Martin Luther King would say he was always trying to keep the flow of love in place. In that sense, he turned the world on its head.

No power on earth can resist the lovers of liberty who are ready not to kill opponents, but be killed by them.

Love is creative, understanding goodwill for all men. It is the refusal to defeat any individual. When you rise to the level of love, of its great beauty and power, you seek only to defeat evil systems. Individuals who happen to be caught up in that system, you love, but you seek to defeat the system.

Nonviolent non-co-operation with evil means co-operation with all that is good.

In that respect, Martin Luther King, whom A.J.[Muste] advised in the civil rights movement, was also a radical pacifist.

I firmly believe that the Gandhian philosophy of nonviolent resistance is the only logical and moral approach to the solution of the race problem in the United States.

Nonviolence is the most potent technique for oppressed people. Unearned suffering is redemptive.

They claim that I'm violent just cuz I refuse to be silent.

History has no record of a nation having adopted nonviolent resistance.