I'd become sort of involved in things that were happening to people. No matter what color they be, whether they be Indians, or Negroes, the poor white person or anyone who was I thought more or less getting a bad shake.

The camera could be a very powerful instrument against discrimination, against poverty, against racism.

I have been born again and again and each time, I have found something to love.

I suffered evils, but without allowing them to rob me of the freedom to expand.

You know, the camera is not meant just to show misery.

I picked up a camera because it was my choice of weapons against what I hated most about the universe: racism, intolerance, poverty. I could have just as easily picked up a knife or a gun, like many of my childhood friends did... most of whom were murdered or put in prison... but I chose not to go that way. I felt that I could somehow subdue these evils by doing something beautiful that people recognize me by, and thus make a whole different life for myself, which has proved to be so.

Washington, D.C. in 1942 was not the easiest place in the world for a Negro to get along.