Abolitionism Quotes & Sayings

When I was a teenager, I was so dumb my mamma knocked me off the porch with a broom. You wish you had so good a mamma. — Deacon Jones

In trying to address the systemic problem of racial injustice, we would do well to look at abolitionism, because here is a movement of radicals who did manage to effect political change. Despite things that radical movements always face, differences and divisions, they were able to actually galvanize the movement and translate it into a political agenda. — Manisha Sinha

First frost meant letting go, so it was always reason to celebrate. — Sarah Addison Allen

We have left behind the rosy agrarian rhetoric and slaveholding reality of Jeffersonian democracy and reside in the bustling world of trade, industry, stock markets, and banks that Hamilton envisioned. (Hamilton's staunch abolitionism formed an integral feature of this economic vision.) He has also emerged as the uncontested visionary in anticipating the shape and powers of the federal government. At a time when Jefferson and Madison celebrated legislative power as the purest expression of the popular will, Hamilton argued for a dynamic executive branch and an independent judiciary, along with a professional military, a central bank, and an advanced financial system. Today, we are indisputably the heirs to Hamilton's America, and to repudiate his legacy is, in many ways, to repudiate the modern world. — Ron Chernow

The subject of British abolitionism has long been controversial, complex, and even baffling. It also raises the issue of moral progress in history - whether groups of reformers and even nations can succeed in eliminating deeply entrenched forms of human oppression, and if so, by what methods, misconceptions, and under what conditions? — David Brion Davis

The fear that we cannot grow beyond whatever distortions we may find within ourselves keeps us docile and loyal and obedient, externally defined, and leads us to accept many facets of our oppression as women. — Audre Lorde

It's both a tremendous obligation and honor to undertake the unfulfilled work of the best of our abolitionist precursors--those who did not only want the abolition of white supremacist slavery and normalized anti-Black violence, but who also recognized that the greatest promise of abolitionism was a comprehensive transformation of a civilization in which the sanctity of white civil society was defined by its capacity to define 'community' and 'safety' through the effective of its ability to wage racial genocides. The present day work of (..) abolition has to proceed with organic recognition of its historical roots in liberation struggles against slavery, colonization, and conquest--and therefore struggle to constantly develop effective, creative, and politically educating forms of radical movement against the genocidal white supremacist state and the society to which it's tethered. — Dylan Rodriguez

With such irresistible evidence before us of the great and rapid progress of abolitionism without the slightest indication of abatement, he is blind who does not see, if the state of things which has caused it should be permitted to continue, that it will speedily be too late, if not to save ourselves, to save the Union. — John C. Calhoun

Educate your children, educate yourself, in the love for the freedom of others, for only in this way will your own freedom not be a gratuitous gift from fate. You will be aware of its worth and will have the courage to defend it. — Joaquim Nabuco

Abolitionism was a movement to end private slavery. Libertarianism is a movement to end private and public slavery. — Jakub Bozydar Wisniewski

LYNDA: Don't get trapped into thinking people are halves instead of wholes.
TINY: People are halves?
LYNDA: They're not trying to sell you on it yet, but believe me, they will. The idea that two is the ideal, and that one is only good as half of two. You are not a half, and you should never treat someone else like a half. Agreed?
TINY: Agreed! — David Levithan

Throughout the three decades preceding the Civil War, the anticlerical ethos of the radical abolitionists was used against them by religious opponents of emancipation, who ... even described abolitionism itself as an atheist plot. — Susan Jacoby

Words are life. Carefully choose your words. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I think human beings must have faith or must look for faith, otherwise our life is empty, empty. To live and not to know why the cranes fly, why children are born, why there are stars in the sky. You must know why you are alive, or else everything is nonsense, just blowing in the wind. — Anton Chekhov

I forked some of my enchiladas in my mouth, only to discover they weren't enchiladas. They were liver and onions that had been mislabeled. I spat it back onto the plate. Dr. Marquez pointed triumphantly. "Ah! See what you just did? You told me a lie, and your own body reacted violently against it. In being dishonest with me, you almost made yourself throw up." "No, I almost threw up because this food sucks," I countered. "It's liver and onions. I didn't like liver and onions back on earth. No one does. So what NASA moron thought it would be a good idea to dehydrate it? — Stuart Gibbs

We often forget that the women's rights movement actually grew out of the abolition movement. It is really within abolitionism that many of the leading women's rights advocates gained experience as organizers and lecturers. — Manisha Sinha

The Oneida Perfectionists, along with some of the others, believed that feminism, and abolitionism, and other causes that they pursued in their own way without participating with other people outside of their communities, were all piecemeal reforms. That's what makes a utopian a utopian, this idea that they were going to create a whole new world from scratch. — Christine Jennings

What you're thinking is what you're becoming. — Muhammad Ali

At no time and in no circumstances should a Communist place his personal interests first; he should subordinate them to the interests of the nation and of the masses. Hence, selfishness, slacking, corruption, seeking the limelight, and so on, are most contemptible, while selflessness, working with all one's energy, whole-hearted devotion to public duty, and quiet hard work will command respect. — Mao Zedong

Self Effort (Purushartha) is that which will bear fruits, without fail. — Dada Bhagwan

The unknown scares man, but those who confront it, will cease to fear it" (Rodolfo Rios Medina) — Rodolfo Rios Medina

The irrepressible conflict propounded by abolitionism has produced now its legitimate fruits - disunion. — John H. Reagan

Honesty is the best policy because there can be nothing less. — Robert Monroe

Patience graciously, compassionately and with understanding, judges the faults of others without unjust criticism. — Billy Graham

Abolitionism did not find positive response in Africa as it did in Western societies and cultures. — Ibn Warraq

Slavery wasn't a crisis for British and American elites until abolitionism turned it into one. Racial discrimination wasn't a crisis until the civil rights movement turned it into one. Sex discrimination wasn't a crisis until feminism turned it into one. Apartheid wasn't a crisis until the anti-apartheid movement turned it into one. — Naomi Klein

Yes, I play dress up! I do it for a living, like a retard! — Jennifer Aniston

I suggest that just as self-consciousness is the goal for all the subhuman forms of life, and as group consciousness, or the consciousness of the Heavenly Man, is the goal for the human being, so for him, also, there may be a goal, and for him the achievement may be the development of God consciousness. — Alice Bailey