If there is no struggle, there is no progress.

I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress.

Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground.

America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future.

We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and the future.

One and God make a majority.

A battle lost or won is easily described, understood, and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it.

The white man's happiness cannot be purchased by the black man's misery.

A little learning, indeed, may be a dangerous thing, but the want of learning is a calamity to any people.

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.