Eric Holder

While he was in the service, in the South and in Oklahoma, he was refused service at a couple of places where he was in uniform, and was told that African Americans, blacks, Negros, were not served. And in spite of that, I've never known a man who loved this country more than my father did.

Guantanamo is a chief recruiting tool for al-Qaida. It has put a wedge between the United States and at least some of its allies.

Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and I believe continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards

In a lot of ways, civil rights division is the conscience of the Justice Department. You can almost measure what kind of Justice Department you have by what kind of civil rights division that you have.

One of the things I learned is that you've got to deal with the underlying social problems if you want to have an impact on crime - that it's not a coincidence that you see the greatest amount of violent crime where you see the greatest amount of social dysfunction.

Those who peacefully gather to express sympathy for the family of Michael Brown must have their rights respected at all times. And journalists must not be harassed or prevented from covering a story that needs to be told.

Communities of color don't understand what it means to be a police officer, the fear that police officers have in just being on the streets.

Though race-related issues continue to occupy a significant portion of our political discussion, and though there remain many unresolved racial issues in this nation, we, average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about things racial.

Although the attorney general is a part of the president's team, you're really separate and apart. You have a special responsibility as the nation's chief law enforcement officer. There has to be a distance that you keep - between this department and the White House.

I am the attorney general of the United States. But I am also a black man.

Enforcement priorities and arrest patterns must not lead to disparate treatment under the law, even if such treatment is unintended. And police forces should reflect the diversity of the communities they serve.

Studies show that if people think that they are treated fairly by the police, that matters almost more than what the result is. If you get stopped for a traffic stop and feel that you are treated courteously and fairly, you are much more likely to accept the fact that you got a speeding ticket.

Ferguson and St. Louis County are not the first places that we have become engaged to ensure fair and equitable policing, and they will not be the last. The Department of Justice will continue to work tirelessly to ensure that the Constitution has meaning for all communities.

I sit here as the first African-American attorney general, serving the first African-American President of the United States. And that has to show that we have made a great deal of progress. But there's still more we have to travel along this road so we get to the place that is consistent with our founding ideals.

If I were attorney general in Kansas in 1953, I would not have defended a Kansas statute that put in place separate-but-equal facilities.

When you compare what people endured in the South in the 60s to try to get the right to vote for African Americans, and to compare what people were subjected to there to what happened in Philadelphia - which was inappropriate, certainly that . . . to describe it in those terms I think does a great disservice to people who put their lives on the line, who risked all, for my people.