“I was a person with dignity and self-respect, and I should not set my sights lower than anybody else just because I was black.”

All I was doing was trying to get home from work.

I was determined to achieve the total freedom that our history lessons.

When the history of this country is written, when a final accounting is done, it is this small, quiet woman whose name will be remembered long after the names of senators and presidents have been forgotten.

I would like to be known as a person who is concerned about freedom and equality and justice and prosperity for all people.

I was ready to die but give my consent never. Never, never.

Our freedom is threatened every time one of our young people is killed by another child, every time a person gets stopped and beaten by the police because of the color of their skin.

Since I have always been a strong believer in God, I knew that He was with me, and only He could get me through that next step.

Differences of race, nationality or religion should not be used to deny any human being citizenship rights or privileges.

I do the very best I can to look upon life with optimism and hope and looking forward to a better day.

The only way for prejudiced people to change is for them to decide for themselves that all human beings should be treated fairly.

No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.

Everyone living together in peace and harmony and love – that’s the goal that we seek, and I think that the more people there are who reach that state of mind, the better we will all be.

An opportunity was being given to me to do what I had asked of others.

The bus was among the first ways I realized there was a black world and a white world.

I believe there is only one race – the human race.

Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and, hopefully, we shall overcome.

I realized now that militancy in the best sense of the word was the only answer where the black man was concerned, that any black man who wasn’t a militant in 1970 was either blind or a coward.

The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers – weak, empty fingers. The only time the black fist has significance is when there’s money inside. There’s where the power lies.

I love Black poets. I love that as a Black girl, I get to participate in that legacy. So that’s Yusef Komunyakaa, Sonia Sanchez, Tracy K. Smith, Phillis Wheatley.

I can’t stand black guys. I would never touch one. It’s gross.

First black president ever, and to be living while it happened – that’s a good part of history. That’s probably the biggest person I admire right now.

I don’t want it to be something that becomes a cage, where to be a successful Black girl, you have to be Amanda Gorman and go to Harvard. I want someone to eventually disrupt the model I have established.

I became aware of how the world is and how the white establishment plays black people against each other.

Hockey is a sport for white men. Basketball is a sport for black men. Golf is a sport for white men dressed like black pimps.