Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over.
Fannie Lou HamerRead
It was the 31st of August in 1962 that eighteen of us traveled twenty-six miles to the county courthouse in Indianola to try to register to become first-class citizens. We was met in Indianola by policemen, Highway Patrolmen, and they only allowed two of us in to take the literacy test at the time.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the struggle for civil rights and the determination to achieve equality.
Fannie Lou Hamer's quote captures the essence of the fight for civil rights in America, specifically highlighting the challenges faced by African Americans in their pursuit of voting rights. The journey to register for the ability to participate fully as citizens underscores the systemic barriers imposed on them, and reveals the courage and resilience of those who dared to challenge injustice despite facing oppression, discrimination, and violence.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech advocating for equal voting rights.
Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over.
You can pray until you faint, but unless you get up and try to do something, God is not going to put it in your lap.
People have got to get together and work together. I'm tired of the kind of oppression that white people have inflicted on us and are still trying to inflict.
One day, I know the struggle will change. There's got to be a change - not only for Mississippi, not only for the people in the United States, but people all over the world.
Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hooks because our lives be threatened daily, because we want to live as decent human beings in America?
I was forced away from the plantation because I wouldn't go back and withdraw, you know, my literacy test after I had tried to take it. I wouldn't go back.
There were many factors as to why I decided to come out as being undocumented. One of them is because I look the way that I look; I don't look like the 'stereotypical undocumented' person.
Giving anyone anything takes courage, since so many presents backfire. A gift conspicuously at odds with your tastes serves only to betray that the benefactor has no earthly clue who you are.
It's a struggle for every young Black man. You know how it is, only God can judge us.
I would rather be alone and a loud voice for action than be silent.
They wrote in the old days that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country. But in modern war, there is nothing sweet nor fitting in your dying. You will die like a dog for no good reason.
I vividly remember early on in my career when I was eight months pregnant, working literally around the clock, and worrying that each trip to the restroom or my need to catch the occasional catnap was causing my colleagues to question whether I could keep up.
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