The wrong to the Negro is temporary, but to the morals of the white man the injury is permanent.

In my mind, I see a line. And over that line, I see green fields and lovely flowers and beautiful white women with their arms stretched out to me over that line, but I can't seem to get there no-how. I can't seem to get over that line.

I distrust the rash optimism in this country that cries, "Hurrah, we're all right! This is the greatest nation on earth," when there are grievances that call loudly for redress.

Until they give me opportunity to write about matters that are not-me, the world must go on uninstructed and unreformed, and I can only do my best with the one small subject upon which I am allowed to discourse.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.

When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

There is not a man beneath the canopy of Heaven who does not know that slavery is wrong for him.

The Christian - the biblical - concept of mercy toward wrongdoers only exists in relation to justice. Showing mercy, in relation to wrongdoing, means treating someone better than they deserve.

And that's why I wrote the book, because our country really needs to understand, if people in this nation understood what our foreign policy is really about, what foreign aid is about, how our corporations work, where our tax money goes, I know we will demand change.

It take many a year, mon, and maybe some bloodshed must be, but righteousness someday prevail.

My greatest concern is that Mitt Romney seldom addresses the social issues publicly... I'm referring to the sanctity of human life, the traditional definition of marriage, and religious liberty.

What does the doctrine of American exceptionalism empower the United States to do? Nothing more than to act better than traditional empires - committed to looting and conquest - have done. So that's American exceptionalism: an exceptionalism based on noble ideas, ideas that it holds itself to even when it falls short of them.