Today's Constitution is a realistic document of freedom only because of several corrective amendments. Those amendments speak to a sense of decency and fairness that I and other Blacks cherish.

Customary greeting to Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, What's shaking, chiefy baby?

The Ku Klux Klan never dies. They just stop wearing sheets because sheets cost too much.

I'm the world's original gradualist. I just think ninety-odd years is gradual enough.

A child born to a Black mother in a state like Mississippi... has exactly the same rights as a white baby born to the wealthiest person in the United States. It's not true, but I challenge anyone to say it is not a goal worth working for.

What's shaking, chiefy baby?

I have a lifetime appointment and I intend to serve it. I expect to die at 110, shot by a jealous husband.