One of the great liabilities of history is that all too many people fail to remain awake through great periods of social change.

The government can't make people love me, but it can keep them from lynching me.

If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live.

The labor movement was the principal force that transformed misery and despair into hope and progress. Out of its bold struggles, economic and social reform gave birth to unemployment insurance, old age pensions, government relief for the destitute, and, above all, new wage levels that meant not mere survival but a tolerable life.

Segregation...not only harms one physically but injures one spiritually...It scars the soul...It is a system which forever stares the segregated in the face, saying 'You are less than...''You are not equal to...'

I have a dream, one dream, keep dreaming. Dream of freedom, justice dreaming, dreaming of equality and hopefully no longer required to dream them

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.