If you tell me that there are obstacles in the way of your ambition that make it impossible to pursue, then I know it's not a real ambition. There are always obstacles. The 'perversity of events,' as someone once called it, is always ready to lick us. Events are never right for achieving what we most want to achieve. If this were not so, there would be no real fun in being 17 -- or even in being alive.

The discrepancy between American ideals and American practice - between our aims and what we actually do - creates a moral dry rot which eats away at the foundations of our democratic faith.

There is no danger is letting people have their say. ... There is a danger when you try to stop them from saying it.

Democracy cannot long survive when the people permit their lives to be dominated - economically or politically - by a powerful few.

To be free you must afford freedom to your neighbor, regardless of race, color, creed, or national origin, and that sometimes, for some, is very difficult.

if we pursue the arms race no other problem will be solved.

If the national security is involved, anything goes. There are no rules. There are people so lacking in roots about what is properand what is improper that they don't know there's anything wrong in breaking into the headquarters of the opposition party.