James T. Rapier Quotes

We have seen the mere distinction of color made in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man.

I couldn't see why a black man wasn't allowed to drink out of the same water fountain or sit in the same bus or go to the same schools as a white guy.

I know 100 percent what it's like to have people tell you that you can't hold an office because of your color, and to have people vote based on that belief.

I know what it's like to feel hopeless and to feel like you're not good enough just because of where you're from. I know what it's like to be profiled and to be abused by the police. I know what it's like to be racially profiled, treated unjustly and abused by the police just because of how you look.

I struggle with racism every day

I never cease to wonder at the amazing presumption of much of white society, assuming that they have the right to bargain with the Negro for his freedom.

I think this mythology - that we're all beyond race, of course our police officers aren't racist, of course our politicians don't mean any harm to people of color - this idea that we're beyond all that (so it must be something else) makes it difficult for young people as well as the grown-ups to be able to see clearly and honestly the truth of what's going on. It makes it difficult to see that the backlash against the Civil Rights Movement manifested itself in the form of mass incarceration, in the form of defunding and devaluing schools serving kids of color and all the rest.

Racism is so extreme and so pervasive in our American society that no black individual lives in an atmosphere of freedom.

I think every Negro over fifty should get a medal for putting up with all that crap.

It's almost impossible to separate the actions, or it's also, it's almost impossible to separate the oppression and exploitation, criminal oppression and criminal exploitation of the American negro from the color of the skin of the person who is the oppressor or the exploiter.

If on Judgement Day I were summoned by St. Peter to give testimony to the used-to-be sheriff's act of kindness, I would be unable to say anything in his behalf. His confidence that my uncle and every other Black man who heard of the Klan's coming ride would scurry under their houses to hide in chicken droppings was too humiliating to hear. Without waiting for Momma's thanks, he rode out of the yard, sure that things were as they should be and that he was a gentle squire, saving those deserving serfs from the laws of the land, which he condoned.

As you grow older, you'll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don't you forget it - whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, he is trash.

[The man] thinks he's being condemned because of his color but actually he's being condemned because of his deeds, his conscious behavior.

the enemies of the colored race who are opposed to their progress and freedom assert that there is no virtue among them.

The whole issue of race and discrimination is a moral issue.

… nothing less than the legalization of racial discrimination

If a white man says, "give me liberty or give me death" in any country, white men all over the world stand up and applaud. But if a black man says the same thing--the exact same words--he is created like a dangerous criminal.

I had felt for a long time that, if I was ever told to get up so a white person could sit, that I would refuse to do so.

The whites were really brutishly ignorant, blitheringly, so they killed people sometimes - just came into the African-American community and maimed people because they didn't agree with God's choice for the colors of the people's skin.

It’s no disgrace to be black, but it’s often very inconvenient.

When a bachelor of philosophy from the Antilles refuses to apply for certification as a teacher on the grounds of his color I say that philosophy has never saved anyone. When someone else strives and strains to prove to me that black men are as intelligent as white men I say that intelligence has never saved anyone: and that is true, for, if philosophy and intelligence are invoked to proclaim the equality of men, they have also been employed to justify the extermination of men.

I think really the whole problem with racism and its continuing legacy in this country is that we simply love it. Who would we be without the 'struggle?'