Political Empowerment Quotes

Every Man A King

If the people want a government of their own they must do the work of making it their own.

Where everyman is participator in the government of affairs, not merely at an election one day in the year but everyday, he will let the heart be torn out of his body sooner than his power be wrested from him by a Caesar or a Bonaparte.

I would have put more emphasis on bringing working class people together to fight for a government that works for all of us.

The working men of Europe felt instinctively that the Star Spangled Banner carried the destiny of their class.

Politics deserves much praise. Politics is a preoccupation of free men, and its existence is a test of freedom. The praise of free men is worth having, for it is the only praise which is free from either servility or condescension.

I collaborated with so many people from Chicago - so many Black people, young Black women organizations like BYP100 and Assata's Daughters. Just being out there, I saw what a community mobilizing can accomplish in terms of freedom and how music and my words in my music can play a significant part in that.

If our political positions were dominated by women, things might be different.

Democracy works when people claim it as their own

We want political power in our country for our philosophy of life. This means we've got to get involved more and more in politics.

The only thing the Socialist [Communist] party could do for the peasant--said the Bolsheviks--was to help organize the paid agricultural laborers.

What the working-classes really need is to be allowed some part in the direction of public affairs.

I talk democracy to these men and women. I tell them that they have the vote, and that theirs is the kingdom and the power and the glory. I say to them You are supreme: exercise your power. They say, That's right: tell us what to do; and I tell them. I say Exercise our vote intelligently by voting for me. And they do. That's democracy; and a splendid thing it is too for putting the right men in the right place.

I think what's fascinating is how many people are playing in politics who maybe haven't played before.

The corporate-powered parties are not gonna do it for us, not the greater or the lesser evil. We have to do it for ourselves. And the minute we stand up and stand together, we are unstoppable.

I think we need to show people that they have a place in the Democratic Party, whether they come from San Francisco or St. Louis.

Scepticism and cynicism about politics is so great that one of the best counters to it is what you can do at a local level.

Grass-roots politics, linking small-dollar fundraising to massive local volunteer organization, showed that it can rival the power of a right-wing machine comprising super PACs backed by entrenched interests and mega-donors.

Politics is pervasive. Everything is political and the choice to be "apolitical" is usually just an endorsement of the status quo and the unexamined life.

We have unleashed aspirations of youngsters. Democracy is not going to go backwards. India is too big a country to be run by one person. We are going to accelerate the process of democratization and I think that is the biggest opportunity for Congress party because that is the DNA of the Congress

Elections are a festival of democracy. Everyone must join this festival of democracy and strengthen it.

Every Indian has a right to take part in politics. Why not me?

The black power movement was not a separation from the civil rights movement, but a continuation of this whole process of democratization.

No one, I hope, can doubt my wish to see... all mankind exercising self-government, and capable of exercising it. But the question is not what we wish, but what is practicable.