We have to improve life, not just for those who have the most skills and those who know how to manipulate the system. But also for and with those who often have so much to give but never get the opportunity.

My mother helped me understand how not to show off what I knew, but how to use it so that others might benefit.

Progress comes from caring more about what needs to be done than about who gets the credit

We are not a problem people, we are people with problems.

We've got to work to save our children and do it with full respect for the fact that if we do not, no one else is going to do it.

Civil rights are civil rights. There are no persons who are not entitled to their civil rights... We have to recognize that we have a long way to go, but we have to go that way together.

I am the product of many whose lives have touched mine, from the famous, distinguished, and powerful to the little known and the poor.