Ruby Bridges Quotes

The black people's struggle has vanquished racism. It was God who created colour. Today Obama, a son of Kenya, a son of Africa, has made it in the United States of America.

I loved Elijah Muhammad with a love that I can't adequately describe.

White society will not listen to preaching. They will not listen to their liberals. Liberalism has not grown within white society, and we blacks cannot stand idly by watching the situation. We can only generate a response from white society when we, as blacks, speak with a black voice and say what we want. Now has come the time when we, as blacks, must articulate what we want, and put it across to the white man, and from a position of strength.

As part of the realization of the aim to eradicate racism in our country, we must strive to create and strengthen a black capitalist class… because we come from among the black oppressed, many among us feel embarrassed to state this goal as nakedly as we should.

The world has made being black a crime .... I hope to make it a virtue.

We are better off than all the other Black people in the entire world. We are the hope and aspiration of Blacks in the rest of the world.

Nobody really loves America more than black Americans, because black Americans loved America even when America didn’t love us back

Black Lives Matter is our call to action. It is a tool to reimagine a world where black people are free to exist, free to live. It is a tool for our allies to show up differently for us.

When I began my political career, I identified with Malcolm X.

Black Lives Matter has become what black communities all over the world have needed it to become. At times, it is a hashtag; at other moments, it is a declaration, a cry of rage, a sharing of light. It has become a movement that is international, worldwide in its scope of liberation for black and oppressed people everywhere.

I am so proud to be black. I am, nevertheless, tired of the oppression. We need to develop and support a cohesive black agenda. We need to do what leaders have suggested since slavery. We need to recognize that while we are not monolithic, there is power in embracing a common agenda.

America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.

There is a magnificent new militancy within the Negro community all across this nation. And I welcome this as a marvelous development. The Negro of America is saying he's determined to be free and he is militant enough to stand up.

I thought our community should have a deep dialogue to make black America better. I believe if we make black America better, we make all of America better.

My daddy, Rev. A. D. King, my granddaddy, Martin Luther King, Senior - we are a family of faith, hope and love.

I'd been very partial to Malcolm X, particularly his self-help teachings.

It is over one hundred years since the abolition of slavery. The Negro people in the United States have taken plenty and they have reached a stage where they have decided that they are not going to take any more.

I think that the thing that we learned back in the day of the civil rights movement is that you do have to keep on keeping on.

The black community has been the foundation of the progressive community in this country for a long time.

And I guess what I would say is that we can't think narrowly about movements for black liberation and we can't necessarily see this class division as simply a product or a certain strategy that black movements have developed for liberation.

Malcolm X made me very strong at a time I needed to understand what I was angry about. He had peace in his heart. He exerted a big influence on me.

I'm a spiritual person, I'm an America, I'm a Jew, and all of those things influence every breath I take, everywhere I go.

I'm a Jew.

As a young black boy, it made me proud to see black leaders that did something amazing and made the world change.

I'm an African American.