I’ve said very clearly, including in a State of the Union address, that I’m against ‚don’t ask, don’t tell‘ and that we’re going to end this policy.

I want a president with a record of public service: someone whose life’s work shows our children that we don’t chase form and fortune for ourselves; we fight to give everyone a chance to succeed.

We don’t want two-tier people in America. Those who are legal but not citizens, and citizens.

Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good.

Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago.

It has always been my belief that a man should do his best, regardless of how much he receives for his services, or the number of people he may be serving or the class of people served.

The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice and destroying the terrible walls which imprison men because they are different from other men.

Coming generations will learn equality from poverty, and love from woes.

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little.

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.

He who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves and, under a just God, cannot long retain it.

I am a strong believer that without justice, there is no peace. No lasting peace, anyway.

The right of every American to first-class citizenship is the most important issue of our time.

Here’s the thing: every office I’ve run for I was the first to win. First person of color. First woman. First woman of color. Every time.

It would make everything I worked for meaningless if baseball is integrated but political parties were segregated.

Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.

Democracy arises out of the notion that those who are equal in any respect are equal in all respects; because men are equally free, they claim to be absolutely equal.

If you’re white and you’re wrong, then you’re wrong; if you’re black and you’re wrong, you’re wrong. People are people. Black, blue, pink, green – God make no rules about color; only society make rules where my people suffer, and that why we must have redemption and redemption now.

The country has come a long way in race relations, but the pendulum swings so far back. Everyone wants to be so sensitive.

Every citizen has the real right to receive general education and professional training at no cost, something that the United States has not been able to ensure for all its inhabitants.

I want to support other women because of the opportunities I’ve had – and I’ve had a lot of opportunities. What I try as a female director is to do the best job I can and, in the meantime, bring attention to as many other female directors and writers as I can.

The battle for the individual rights of women is one of long standing and none of us should countenance anything which undermines it.

Instead of noblemen, let us have noble villages of men.

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination – and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past – are real and must be addressed.

Science is global. Einstein’s equation, E=mc2, has to reach everywhere. Science is a beautiful gift to humanity, we should not distort it. Science does not differentiate between multiple races.

I stand for anti-bigotry, anti-Semitism, and anti-racism.

I never had that feeling that I had to carry the weight of somebody’s ignorance around with me. And that was true for racists who wanted to use the ‚n‘ word when talking about me or about my people, or the stupidity of people who really wanted to belittle other folks because they weren’t pretty or they weren’t rich or they weren’t clever.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

If proud Americans can be who they are and boldly stand at the altar with who they love then surely, surely we can give everyone in this country a fair chance at that great American Dream.

To change criminal justice policy in any meaningful way means to propose changing a very longstanding system. It’s not realistic to think you can do it overnight.

Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior.

The black press, some liberal sportswriters, and even a few politicians were banging away at those Jim Crow barriers in baseball. I never expected the walls to come tumbling down in my lifetime.

All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge? We shouldn’t marginalise people for this. They must be integrated into society.

The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.

I don’t even call them fans. I don’t like that. They’re literally just a part of my life; they’re a part of my family. I don’t think of them as on a lower level than me. I don’t think I’m anything but equal to all of them. So yeah, they’re basically all of my siblings.

I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I am not in favor of gay marriage. But when you start playing around with constitutions, just to prohibit somebody who cares about another person, it just seems to me that’s not what America’s about. Usually, our constitutions expand liberties, they don’t contract them.

I favor the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and it must be enforced at gunpoint if necessary.

I believe in the spirit of equality and the spirit of this country as one of love and compassion and kindness.

In too many communities, too many young men of color are left behind and seen only as objects of fear. Through initiatives like My Brother’s Keeper, I’m personally committed to changing both perception and reality.

I want a president who will teach our children that everyone in this country matters, a president who truly believes in the vision that our Founders put forth all those years ago that we are all created equal, each a beloved part of the great American story.

I should like to know if, taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, you begin making exceptions to it, where will you stop? If one man says it does not mean a Negro, why not another say it does not mean some other man?

It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others: or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own.

It is not true that people are naturally equal for no two people can be together for even a half an hour without one acquiring an evident superiority over the other.

There are millions of Americans outside Washington who are tired of stale political arguments and are moving this country forward. They believe, and I believe, that here in America, our success should depend not on accident of birth, but the strength of our work ethic and the scope of our dreams.

I don’t stand for the black man’s side, I don‘ t stand for the white man’s side. I stand for God’s side.

Everyone got kind of crazy with me mentioning I was in love with a woman.

Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

What I believe is that marriage is between a man and a woman, but what I also believe is that we have an obligation to make sure that gays and lesbians have the rights of citizenship that afford them visitations to hospitals, that allow them to be, to transfer property between partners, to make certain that they’re not discriminated on the job.

Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.

I married my best friend that happens to be a girl.

We have two evils to fight, capitalism and racism. We must destroy both racism and capitalism.

When you truly accept that those children in some far off place in the global village have the same value as you in God’s eyes or even in just your eyes, then your life is forever changed; you see something that you can’t un-see.

We are all alike, on the inside.

Peace and justice are two sides of the same coin.

We should not say that one man’s hour is worth another man’s hour, but rather that one man during an hour is worth just as much as another man during an hour. Time is everything, man is nothing: he is at the most time’s carcass.

The time is long overdue to stop looking for progress through racial or ethnic leaders. Such leaders have too many incentives to promote polarizing attitudes and actions that are counterproductive for minorities and disastrous for the country.

I’ve never thought about any kind of prejudice about women in country music because I never felt like it affected me. I was fortunate enough to come about in a time when I didn’t feel that kind of energy at all, and it was always my theory that if you want to play in the same ballgame as the boys, you’ve got to work as hard as them.

The truth is, no one of us can be free until everybody is free.

If we help an educated man’s daughter to go to Cambridge are we not forcing her to think not about education but about war? – not how she can learn, but how she can fight in order that she might win the same advantages as her brothers?

High-quality early-childhood programs and health coverage have expanded, and the number of mentoring relationships for at-risk youth has risen dramatically. That progress is encouraging, but it’s not evenly distributed.