Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago.

No true believer could be intolerant or a persecutor. If I were a magistrate and the law carried the death penalty against atheists, I would begin by sending to the stake whoever denounced another.

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.

They call upon us to supply American boys to do the job that Asian boys should do.

I am worrying about my country. I feel I have a responsibility as a novelist to do something.

I was the first tenured woman at Columbia. That was 1972; every law school was looking for its woman. Why? Because Stan Pottinger, who was then head of the office for civil rights of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, was enforcing the Nixon government contract program.

Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.

The ideals and principles for which Dr King fought have never been forgotten and are as relevant today as they were 40 years ago.

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.

In the summer of 1966, I went to Mississippi to be in the heart of the civil-rights movement, helping people who had been thrown off the farms or taken off the welfare roles for registering to vote. While working there, I met the civil-rights lawyer I later married – we became an interracial couple.

Our object in the construction of the state is the greatest happiness of the whole, and not that of any one class.

The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate… we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just.

June Jordan, who died of cancer in 2002, was a brilliant, fierce, radical, and frequently furious poet. We were friends for thirty years. Not once in that time did she step back from what was transpiring politically and morally in the world. She spoke up, and led her students, whom she adored, to do the same.

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

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

Gentleness, self-sacrifice and generosity are the exclusive possession of no one race or religion.

I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.

When I was a child I asked my mother what homosexuality was about and she said – and this was 100 years ago in Germany and she was very open-minded – ‚It’s like hair color. It’s nothing. Some people are blond and some people have dark hair. It’s not a subject.‘ This was a very healthy attitude.

Justice… is a kind of compact not to harm or be harmed.

Politics ought to be the part-time profession of every citizen who would protect the rights and privileges of free people and who would preserve what is good and fruitful in our national heritage.

I don’t think any country is perfect. It’s our responsibility to do the best we can do to change the things we don’t like. I think that’s part of social responsibility, and everybody is going to do that in their own way.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

DACA recipients risk a lot to come out of the shadows & sign up, but many will tell you the risk is worth being able to live and work in the only country they’ve ever known as home. DACA recipients serve in our military, work in Fortune 100 companies, and conduct important medical research.

There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity – the law of nature and of nations.

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself.

It’s hard not to have a big year at the Supreme Court.

I should not regret a fair and full trial of the entire abolition of capital punishment.

I wish I could say to all those people who consider themselves anarchists or radicals: Please join the nonviolent movement. This is how Gandhi freed India. If Gandhi freed India, we can certainly free the United States from our racism, misogyny, and bigotry.

There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it.

Particularly conservative Christians, I was very angry that they were not involved more in the AIDS emergency.

No one has been barred on account of his race from fighting or dying for America, there are no white or colored signs on the foxholes or graveyards of battle.

I’m not for gay marriage, but I’m not for discriminating against people.

I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.

In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme.

We are proud of the history of our country; we learned it in school and have grown up hearing of freedom, justice and human rights.

Men and women aren’t the same. And they won’t be the same. That doesn’t mean that they can’t be treated fairly.

Racism is real in this country.

Injustice is relatively easy to bear; what stings is justice.

I refuse to allow any man-made differences to separate me from any other human beings.

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.

I don’t think there is a single social issue I haven’t spoken on.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

What is human warfare but just this; an effort to make the laws of God and nature take sides with one party.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

I used to always fight for human rights. I still fight for Leonard Peltier, who’s spent 35 years in jail for a crime he didn’t commit.

Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe.

A calling is you feel – you look out and see the need – maybe it’s the need for the poor, to help poor people. Maybe it’s the need to get involved in the race problem, as Martin Luther King was – felt called.

In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free – honorable alike in that we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.

If I were a Negro, I’d be fighting, as Martin Luther King fought, for human recognition and justice. I’d rather go down with my flag flying. If you’re weak or crippled, or you can’t speak out or fight back in some way, then people don’t hesitate to treat you badly.

If the law is upheld only by government officials, then all law is at an end.

Foolish men imagine that because judgment for an evil thing is delayed, there is no justice; but only accident here below. Judgment for an evil thing is many times delayed some day or two, some century or two, but it is sure as life, it is sure as death.

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.

All people are born alike – except Republicans and Democrats.

My music fights against the system that teaches to live and die.

For me, my secularism is, India first. I say, the philosophy of my party is ‚Justice to all. Appeasement to none.‘ This is our secularism.

It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.

It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right.

Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior.

Never pray for justice, because you might get some.

We still have many neighborhoods that are racially identified. We still have many schools that even though the days of state-enforced segregation are gone, segregation because of geographical boundaries remains.

The American dream belongs to all of us.