You must get an education. You must go to school, and you must learn to protect yourself. And you must learn to protect yourself with the pen, and not the gun.

The hate directed against the colored people here in St. Louis has always given me a sad feeling... How can you expect the world to believe in you and respect your preaching of democracy when you yourself treat your colored brothers as you do?

Let us stop saying 'white Americans' and 'colored Americans,' let us try once and for all saying... Americans. Let human beings be equal on Earth as in Heaven.

Friends, to me for years St. Louis represented a city of fear... humiliation... misery and terror... A city where in the eyes of the white man a Negro should know his place and had better stay in it.

The secret to the fountain of youth is to think youthful thoughts.

We must change the system of education and instruction. Unfortunately, history has shown us that brotherhood must be learned, when it should be natural.

We've got to show that blacks and whites are treated equally in the army. Otherwise, what's the point of waging war on Hitler?