The Afro-American is not a bestial race. If this work can contribute in any way towards proving this, and at the same time arouse the conscience of the American people to a demand for justice to every citizen, and punishment by law for the lawless, I shall feel I have done my race a service. Other considerations are of minor importance.
— Ida B. Wells
Superior American Justice quotations
Peace cannot exist without justice, justice cannot exist without fairness, fairness cannot exist without development, development cannot exist without democracy, democracy cannot exist without respect for the identity and worth of cultures and peoples.
One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.
We do not want churches because they will teach us to quarrel about God.
We do not want to learn that. We may quarrel with men sometimes about things on this earth, but we never quarrel about the Great Spirit. We do not want to learn that.
Violence is black children going to school for 12 years and receiving 6 years' worth of education.
I'll tell you how I'd like to be remembered: As a black man who won the heavyweight title - Who has humorous and who never looked down on those who looked up to him - A man who stood for freedom, justice and equality - And I wouldn't even mind if folks forgot how pretty I was.
My father was a slave and my people died to build this country and I am going to stay here and have a part of it just like you.
The path to glory is rough, and many gloomy hours obscure it.
May the Great Spirit shed light on your path, so that you may never experience the humility that the power of the American government has reduced me to. This is the wish of a man who, in his native forests, was once as proud and bold as yourself.
The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of bold projects and new ideas. Rather, it will belong to those who can blend passion, reason and courage in a personal commitment to the great enterprises and ideals of American society.
Once brave politicians and others explain the war on drugs' true cost, the American people will scream for a cease-fire. Bring the troops home, people will urge. Treat drugs as a health problem, not as a matter for the criminal justice system.
The death of chief justice Rehnquist and the president's nomination of John Roberts raises the stakes for the court and the American people exponentially.
I therefore believe that our system does not have a word for failed trial, and that is where the American public does not realize that our criminal justice system sometimes makes mistakes.
We're like the Three Musketeers, searching for truth and justice and the American way.: Glitch snorted. "More like the Three Blind Mice, stumbling around trying to find a hunk of cheese in the dark.
This big dog will fight when you rattle his cage And you'll be sorry that you messed with The U.S. of A. 'Cause we'll put a boot in your ass It's the American way.
Major Strasser: You give him (Rick Blaine) credit for too much cleverness.
My impression was that he's just another blundering American. Captain Renault: We musn't underestimate American blundering. I was with them when they blundered into Berlin in 1918.
Americanism means the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity, and hardihood - the virtues that made America.
It is the spirit and not the form of law that keeps justice alive.
The basic goal of labor will not change.
It is - as it has always been, and I am sure always will be - to better the standards of life for all who work for wages and to seek decency and justice and dignity for all Americans.
Some years ago I said in an opinion that if this country is a melting pot, then either the Afro-Americans didn't get in the pot or he didn't get melted down.
Today the children of our public schools are taught more of the history, heroes, legends, and sagas of the old world than of the land of their birth, while they are furnished with little material on the people and institutions that are truly American.
The very moment you understand that being a Muslim and being American or European are not mutually exclusive, you enrich your society. Promote the universal principles of justice and freedom, and leave the societies elsewhere to find their model of democracy based on their collective psychology and cultural heritage.
Black people are dying in this country because we have a criminal justice system which is out of control, a system in which over 50% of young African American kids are unemployed. It is estimated that a black baby born today has a one in four chance of ending up in the criminal justice system.
One in three young African American men is currently under the control of the criminal justice system in prison, in jail, on probation, or on parole - yet mass incarceration tends to be categorized as a criminal justice issue as opposed to a racial justice or civil rights issue (or crisis).
The fact that more than half of the young black men in any large American city are currently under the control of the criminal justice system (or saddled with criminal records) is not - as many argue - just a symptom of poverty or poor choices, but rather evidence of a new racial caste system at work.
The problem that has no name-which is simply the fact that American women are kept from growing to their full human capacities-is taking a far greater toll on the physical and mental health of our country than any known disease.
Unfortunately, the American justice system is just riddled with lies and inconsistencies.
we have accumulated a wealth of historical experience which confirms our belief that the scales of American justice are out of balance.
To summarize: Americans have one of the greatest legal systems, but not a monopoly of the sense of justice, which is universal; nor have we a permanent copyright on the means of securing justice, for it is the spirit and not the form of law that keeps justice alive.
My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over.
Our Constitution works; our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule. But there is a higher Power, by whatever name we honor Him, who ordains not only righteousness but love, not only justice but mercy.
Let justice be done though the heavens should fall.
Every year, an average of 9,200 Americans are murdered by handguns, according to Department of Justice statistics. This does not include suicides or the tens of thousands of robberies, rapes and assaults committed with handguns. This level of violence must be stopped.
We have to undo the millions of little white lies that America told itself and the world about the American Black man.
Specifically, the growing threat that sexual predators pose to our Nation's children and their families represents an area where our criminal justice system has failed the American people.
