As we here in the United States celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr Day, we thought it would be nice to take a moment and celebrate the Civil Rights Movement, especially the many women who influenced it. The women we quote below were all leaders of the Civil Rights Movement; several were recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and the NAACP’s Spingarn Medal. We hope you are as inspired by these quotes — and these women — as we are.
Source: The Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
“Give light and people will find the way.”
-Ella Baker, Activist
“No man or woman who tries to pursue an ideal in his or her own way is without enemies.”
-Daisy Bates, Journalist
“Invest in the human soul. Who knows, it might be a diamond in the rough.”
– Mary Mcleod Bethune, Educator and Activist
“I have learned over the years that when one’s mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.”
– Rosa Parks, Activist
“Surely nowhere in the world do oppression and persecution based solely on the color of the skin appear more hateful and hideous than in the capital of the United States, because the chasm between the principles upon which this Government was founded, in which it still professes to believe, and those which are daily practiced under the protection of the flag, yawn so wide and deep.”
– Mary Church Terrell, founder of National Association of Colored Women
“Greatness is not measured by what a man or woman accomplishes, but by the opposition he or she has overcome to reach his goals.”
– Dorothy Height, former president of the National Council of Negro Women
“Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”
– Fannie Lou Hamer, organizer Mississippi Freedom Summer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
Nerdy Chicks Rule 