110+ Cesar Chavez Quotes On Education, Justice And Non Violence

Cesar Chavez was an American civil rights activist who fought for the rights of migrant workers in the United States. He co-founded the National Farm Workers Association in 1962, which later became the United Farm Workers union. He led a number of non-violent protests and strikes, and was a major figure in the American labor movement. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Cesar Chavez on education, justice, leadership.

Top 10 Cesar Chavez Quotes

1. To make a great dream come true, the first requirement is a great capacity to dream; the second is persistence.
2. Preservation of one's own culture does not require contempt or disrespect for other cultures.
3. True wealth is not measured in money or status or power. It is measured in the legacy we leave behind for those we love and those we inspire.
4. Non-violence is not inaction. It is not discussion. It is not for the timid or weak... Non-violence is hard work.
5. The people united will never be defeated.
6. In giving of yourself, you will discover a whole new life full of meaning and love.
7. Grant me courage to serve others; For in service there is true life.
8. You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read.
9. If you really want to make a friend, go to someone's house and eat with him... the people who give you their food give you their heart.
10. The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people.

Cesar Chavez Image Quotes

You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read. — Cesar Chavez

The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people. — Cesar Chavez

The people who give you their food give you their heart. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Short Quotes

• We draw our strength from the very despair in which we have been forced to live. We shall endure.
• We have looked into the future and the future is ours.
• Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed.
• When you sacrifice, you force others to sacrifice. It's an extremely powerful weapon.
• Our language is the reflection of ourselves.
• Only when we have become nonviolent towards all life will we have learned to live well with others.
• It is my deepest belief that only by giving our lives do we find life.
• You are never strong enough that you don't need help.
• Talk is cheap...It is the way we organize and use our lives everyday that tells what we believe in.
• It takes a lot of punishment to be able to do anything to change the social order.

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Education

Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed. You cannot un-educate the person who has learned to read. You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore. Cesar Chavez Address to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, Nov. 9, 1984 — Cesar Chavez

Real education should consist of drawing the goodness and the best out of our own students. What better books can there be than the book of humanity? — Cesar Chavez

The end of all knowledge must be the building up of character. — Cesar Chavez

Years of misguided teaching have resulted in the destruction of the best in our society, in our cultures and in the environment. — Cesar Chavez

Organizing is an educational process. The best educational process in the union is the picket line and the boycott. You learn about life. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Justice

Our struggle is not easy. Those who oppose our cause are rich and powerful and they have many allies in high places. We are poor. Our allies are few. But we have something the rich do not own. We have our bodies and spirits and the justice of our cause as our weapons. — Cesar Chavez

I am convinced that the truest act of courage, the strongest act of manliness, is to sacrifice ourselves for others in a totally nonviolent struggle for justice. To be a man is to suffer for others. God help us to be men! — Cesar Chavez

We are confident. We have ourselves. We know how to sacrifice. We know how to work. We know how to combat the forces that oppose us. But even more than that, we are true believers in the whole idea of justice. Justice is so much on our side, that that is going to see us through. — Cesar Chavez

When the man who feeds the world by toiling in the fields is himself deprived of the basic rights of feeding, sheltering, and caring for his own family, the whole community of man is sick. — Cesar Chavez

If you give yourself totally to the nonviolence struggle for peace and justice you also find that people give you their hearts and you will never go hungry and never be alone. — Cesar Chavez

Because we have suffered, and we are not afraid to suffer in order to survive, we are ready to give up everything - even our lives - in our struggle for justice. — Cesar Chavez

There is a great fear of our Union - a fear that I do not fully understand, but that I know is present...What is it that causes some men to act so hastily and so cruelly? It cannot be that we are so powerful. Is it so much to ask that the poorest people of the land have a measure of justice? — Cesar Chavez

We shall strike. We shall organize boycotts. We shall demonstrate and have political campaigns. We shall pursue the revolution we have proposed. We are sons and daughters of the farm workers' revolution, a revolution of the poor seeking bread and justice. — Cesar Chavez

It's ironic that those who till the soil, cultivate and harvest the fruits, vegetables, and other foods that fill your tables with abundance have nothing left for themselves. — Cesar Chavez

The love for justice that is in us is not only the best part of our being but it is also the most true to our nature. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Leadership

I am an organizer, not a union leader. A good organizer has to work hard and long. There are no shortcuts. You just keep talking to people, working with them, sharing, exchanging and they come along. — Cesar Chavez

When poor people get involved in a long conflict, such as a strike or a civil rights drive, and the pressure increases each day, there is a deep need for spiritual advice. Without it, we see families crumble, leadership weaken, and hard workers grow tired. — Cesar Chavez

I'm not going to ask for anything unless the workers want it. If they want it, they'll ask for it. — Cesar Chavez

There are many reasons for why a man does what de does. To be himself he must be able to give it all. If a leader cannot give it all he cannot expect his people to give anything. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Non Violence

There's no reason to be non-violent. There's no challenge unless you are living for people. — Cesar Chavez

The non-violent technique does not depend for its success on the goodwill of the oppressor, but rather on the unfailing assistance of God. — Cesar Chavez

Non-violence exacts a very high price from one who practices it. But once you are able to meet that demand then you can do most things. — Cesar Chavez

There is no such thing as defeat in non-violence. — Cesar Chavez

The first principle of non-violent action is that of non-cooperation with everything humiliating. — Cesar Chavez

In some cases non-violence requires more militancy than violence. — Cesar Chavez

Imagine the National Guard being called against a group of peaceful people. How far can we get; how disgraceful can it become? It's the most disgraceful, the most wicked thing I've seen in all my years of organizing farm labor. — Cesar Chavez

We are convinced that non-violence is more powerful than violence. We are convinced that non-violence supports you if you have a just and moral cause...If you use violence, you have to sell part of yourself for that violence. Then you are no longer a master of your own struggle. — Cesar Chavez

When workers fall back on violence, they are lost. Oh, they might win some of their demands and might end a strike a little earlier, but they give up their imagination, their creativity, their will to work hard and to suffer for what they believe is right. — Cesar Chavez

You know, if people are not pacifists, it's not their fault. It's because society puts them in that spot. You've got to change it. You don't just change a man - you've got to change his environment as you do it. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Poor

History will judge societies and governments - and their institutions - not by how big they are or how well they serve the rich and the powerful, but by how effectively they respond to the needs of the poor and the helpless. — Cesar Chavez

It's amazing how people can get so excited about a rocket to the moon and not give a damn about smog, oil leaks, the devastation of the environment with pesticides, hunger, disease. When the poor share some of the power that the affluent now monopolize, we will give a damn. — Cesar Chavez

Do not romanticize the poor...We are all people, human beings subject to the same temptations and faults as all others. Our poverty damages our dignity. — Cesar Chavez

Who gets the risks? The risks are given to the consumer, the unsuspecting consumer and the poor work force. And who gets the benefits? The benefits are only for the corporations, for the money makers. — Cesar Chavez

Money is not going to organize the disadvantaged, the powerless, or the poor. We need other weapons. That's why the War on Poverty is such a miserable failure. You put out a big pot of money and all you do is fight over it. Then you run out of money and you run out of troops. — Cesar Chavez

We learned many years ago that the rich may have money, but the poor have time. — Cesar Chavez

Since the Church is to be servant to the poor, it is our fault if that wealth is not channeled to help the poor in our world. — Cesar Chavez

As long as we have a poor country bordering California, it's going to be very difficult to win strikes. — Cesar Chavez

Though many of the poor have come to see the affluent middle class as its enemy, that class actually stands between the poor and the real powers in this society - the administrative octopus with its head in Washington, the conglomerates, the military complex. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About People

You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore. — Cesar Chavez

From the depth of need and despair, people can work together, can organize themselves to solve their own problems and fill their own needs with dignity and strength. — Cesar Chavez

The people who give you their food give you their heart. — Cesar Chavez

[We believe that unions have always been about much more than the industries in which they operate.] The fight is never about grapes or lettuce, ... It is always about people. — Cesar Chavez

When you have people together who believe in something very strongly - whether it's religion or politics or unions - things happen. — Cesar Chavez

Across the San Joaquin Valley, across California, across the entire Southwest of the United States, wherever there are Mexican people, wherever there are farm workers, our movement is spreading like flames across a dry plain. — Cesar Chavez

Kindness and compassion towards all living things is a mark of a civilized society. Conversely, cruelty, whether it is directed against human beings or against animals, is not the exclusive province of any one culture or community of people. — Cesar Chavez

Non-violence has suffered its biggest defeat in the hands of people who most want to talk about it. — Cesar Chavez

Non violence means people in action. People have to understand that with non-violence goes a hell of a lot of organization. — Cesar Chavez

Being of service is not enough. You must become a servant of the people. When you do, you can demand their commitment in return. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Quotes About Farm

Our very lives are dependent, for sustenance, on the sweat and sacrifice of the campesinos. Children of farm workers should be as proud of their parents' professions as other children are of theirs. — Cesar Chavez

The consumer boycott is the only open door in the dark corridor of nothingness down which farm workers have had to walk for many years. It is a gate of hope through which they expect to find the sunlight of a better life for themselves and their families. — Cesar Chavez

We farm workers are closest to food production. We were the first to recognize the serious health hazards of agriculture pesticides to both consumers and ourselves. — Cesar Chavez

There is no law for farm labor organizing, save the law of the jungle. — Cesar Chavez

Farm workers are society's canaries. Farm workers - and their children - demonstrate the effects of pesticide poisoning before anyone else. — Cesar Chavez

We are tired of words, of betrayals, of indifference...they years are gone when the farm worker said nothing an did nothing to help himself...Now we have new faith. Through our strong will, our movement is changing these conditions...We shall be heard. — Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez Famous Quotes And Sayings

We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community... Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own. — Cesar Chavez

I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry and unhappy like we do. I feel very deeply about vegetarianism and the animal kingdom. It was my dog Boycott who led me to question the right of humans to eat other sentient beings. — Cesar Chavez

You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read. — Cesar Chavez

The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people. — Cesar Chavez

The people who give you their food give you their heart. — Cesar Chavez

In 1968, I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry, and unhappy like we do. — Cesar Chavez

We need to help students and parents cherish and preserve the ethnic and cultural diversity that nourishes and strengthens this community - and this nation. — Cesar Chavez

There's no turning back...We will win. We are winning because ours is a revolution of mind and heart. — Cesar Chavez

There is enough love and good will in our movement to give energy to our struggle and still have plenty left over to break down and change the climate of hate and fear around us. — Cesar Chavez

Students must have initiative; they should not be mere imitators. They must learn to think and act for themselves - and be free. — Cesar Chavez

Never, never is it possible to reach someone if you become angry or bitter only love and gentleness can do it. Maybe not this time but maybe the next or the hundredth time. — Cesar Chavez

In the final analysis it doesn't really matter what the political system is...We don't need perfect political systems; we need perfect participation. — Cesar Chavez

Today, the growers are like a punch-drunk old boxer who doesn't know he's past his prime. The times are changing. The political and social environment has changed. The chickens are coming home to roost - and the time to account for past sins is approaching. — Cesar Chavez

When we are really honest with ourselves we must admit our lives are all that really belong to us. So it is how we use our lives that determines the kind of men we are. — Cesar Chavez

Society is made up of groups, and as long as the smaller groups do not have the same rights and the same protection as others - I don['t care whether you call it capitalism or communism -it is not going to work. Somehow, the guys in power have to be reached by counterpower, or through a change in their hearts and minds, or change will not come. — Cesar Chavez

I've always maintained that it isn't the form that's going to make the difference. It isn't the rule or the procedure or the ideology, but it's human beings that will make it. — Cesar Chavez

Through Gandhi and my own life experience, I have learned about nonviolence. I believe that human life is a very special gift from God, and that no one has a right to take that away in any cause, however just. I am convinced that nonviolence is more powerful than violence. — Cesar Chavez

We know what unions have done for other people. We have seen it and we have studied and we have cherished the idea of unionism. We have seen the history and development of unions in this country and we tell the growers that we want nothing more, but that we want our own union and we are going to fight for it as long as it takes. — Cesar Chavez

If you are interested in preventing animal suffering, the first thing you should give up is eggs and milk, because the animals who produce those foods lead the most unhappy lives. You would do better to eat meat and stop eating eggs and dairy products. — Cesar Chavez

We know we cannot defend to be kind to animals until we stop exploiting them - exploiting animals in the name of science, exploiting animals in the name of sport, exploiting animals in the name of fashion, and yes, exploiting animals in the name of food. — Cesar Chavez

Every time we sit at a table at night or in the morning to enjoy the fruits and grain and vegetables from our good earth, remember that they come from the work of men and women and children who have been exploited for generations. — Cesar Chavez

Look at the John Birch Society. Look at Hitler. The reactionaries are always better organizers. — Cesar Chavez

Self dedication is a spiritual experience. — Cesar Chavez

it is clearly evident that our path travels through a valley of teas well known to all farm workers, because in all valleys the way of the farm worker has bene one of sacrifice for generations. Our sweat and our blood have fallen on this land to make other men rich. This Pilgrimage is a witness to the suffering we have seen for generations. — Cesar Chavez

It is possible to become discouraged about the injustice we see everywhere. But God did not promise us that the world would be humane and just. He gives us the gift of life and allows us to choose the way we will use our limited time on earth. It is an awesome opportunity. — Cesar Chavez

In the no-nonsense school of adversity, which we did not choose for ourselves, we are learning how to operate a labor union. — Cesar Chavez

...the workers aren't going to stop struggling. They're going to struggle to have a union and they have the right to have it. The police repression and the grower indifference to the workers' demands for recognition cannot go unheard so we're going to keep on struggling until we get that recognition. — Cesar Chavez

What is at stake is human dignity. If a man is not accorded respect he cannot respect himself and if he does not respect himself, he cannot demand it. — Cesar Chavez

However important the struggle is and however much misery and poverty and degradation exist, we know that it cannot be more important than one human life. — Cesar Chavez

I would not take one cup of coffee from a grower...There's not a good one. I hate them. A few presents, a little talk, then the noose. That's how capitalism works. — Cesar Chavez

The strike and the boycott, they have cost us much. What they have not paid us in wages, better working conditions, and new contracts, they have paid us in self-respect and human dignity. — Cesar Chavez

It is not good enough to know why we are oppressed and by whom. We must join the struggle for what is right and just. Jesus does not promise that it will be an easy way to live life and His own life certainly points in a hard direction; but it does promise that we will be "satisfied" (not stuffed; but satisfied). He promises that by giving life we will find life - full, meaningful life as God meant it. — Cesar Chavez

We're going to pray a lot and picket a lot. — Cesar Chavez

We do not need to kill or destroy to win. We are a movement that builds and not destroys. — Cesar Chavez

Perhaps we can bring the day when children will learn from their earliest days that being fully man and fully woman means to give one's life to the liberation of the brother [and sister] who suffers. It is up to each one of us. It won't happen unless we decide to use our lives to show the way. — Cesar Chavez

When any person suffers for someone in greater need, that person is a human. — Cesar Chavez

Those who are willing to sacrifice and be of service have very little difficulty with people. They know what they are all about. People can't help but want to be near them. They help them; they work with them. That's what love is all about. It starts with your heart and radiates out. — Cesar Chavez

Violence just hurts those who are already hurt...Instead of exposing the brutality of the oppressor, it justifies it. — Cesar Chavez

We need, in a special way, to work twice as hard to help people understand that animals are fellow creatures, that we must protect them and love them as we love ourselves... — Cesar Chavez

The basis for peace is respecting all creatures. — Cesar Chavez

Together, all things are possible — Cesar Chavez

If you want to remember me, organize! — Cesar Chavez

Concentration is inspiration. You must be completely overtaken by your work and your subject. Only then do all your influences and experience come up to the surface. — Cesar Chavez

Non-violence is a very powerful weapon. Most people don't understand the power of non-violence and tend to be amazed by the whole idea. Those who have been involved in bringing about change and see the difference between violence and non-violence are firmly committed to a lifetime of non-violence, not because it is easy or because it is cowardly, but because it is an effective and very powerful way. — Cesar Chavez

Our language is the reflection of ourselves. A language is an exact reflection of the character and growth of its speakers. — Cesar Chavez

...many have the idea that organizing people is very difficult, but it isn't. It becomes difficult only at the point where you begin to see other things that are easier. But if you are willing to give the time and make the sacrifice, it's not that difficult to organize. — Cesar Chavez

To be a man is to suffer for others. God help us to be men! — Cesar Chavez

Life Lessons by Cesar Chavez

1. Cesar Chavez taught us the importance of standing up for what you believe in and fighting for justice and equality.
2. He also demonstrated the power of peaceful protest and the importance of working together to achieve a common goal.
3. Lastly, he showed us the power of perseverance and the importance of never giving up in the face of adversity.