John Lewis Quotes

If you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have a moral obligation to do something about it.

You cannot be afraid to speak up and speak out for what you believe. You have to have courage, raw courage.

We may not have chosen the time, but the time has chosen us.

When people tell me nothing has changed, I say come walk in my shoes and I will show you change.

If you're not hopeful and optimistic, then you just give up. You have to take that long hard look and just believe that if your consistent, you will succeed

I say from time to time that the vote is precious. It's almost sacred. It is the most powerful nonviolent tool or instrument that we have in a democratic society. And we must use it.

Don't give up! Don't give in! Keep the faith! And keep your eyes on the prize!

You cannot give up - you have to be persistent and keep pushing, and press on.

I truly believe that one day we will get there, we will arrive. And if we do it right in America, maybe, just maybe, we can serve as a model for the rest of the world.

You have to have the capacity and the ability to take what people did, and how they did it, and forgive them and move on.

We will stand up for what is right, for what is fair and what is just. Health care is a right and not a privilege.

We never gave up. We didn't get lost in a sea of despair. We kept the faith. We kept pushing and pulling. We kept marching. And we made some progress.

I say to people today, 'You must be prepared if you believe in something. If you believe in something, you have to go for it. As individuals, we may not live to see the end.

People must understand that people were beaten, arrested, jailed, and some people were murdered, while attempting to register to vote, or to get others to register to vote.

When growing up, I saw segregation. I saw racial discrimination. I saw those signs that said white men, colored men. White women, colored women. White waiting. And I didn't like it.

We built a coalition of conscience, and that we can do it again, and we can go forward, and help redeem the soul of America.

To make it hard, to make it difficult almost impossible for people to cast a vote is not in keeping with the democratic process.

In spite of all of the things, the issues, that we may be confronting today, I'm very hopeful, very optimistic about the future.

Races don't fall in love, genders don't fall in love: Individuals fall in love. We all should be free to marry the person that we love.

But you have to have hope. You have to be optimistic in order to continue to move forward.

The reward for playing jazz is playing jazz.

I've said it in the past and I'll say it again today: the vote is precious; it's almost sacred.

We're not questioning the legitimacy of the outcome of the election. You didn't have Republicans questioning whether or not [Barack] Obama legitimately beat John McCain in 2008.

Be prepared to organize nonviolent workshops - a teach-in around what is happening in America today. Organize your teachers and schoolmates, and be prepared to engage in some action.

Stalin’s postwar goals were security for himself, his regime, his country, and his ideology, in precisely that order.

The government, both state and federal, has a duty to be reasonable and accommodating.

I would say to a young person: continue to study. Study what is taking place in your community, in your neighborhood, maybe at your school.

Many of us in Nashville accepted nonviolence as a way of life, a way of living, not simply as a technique or a tactic.

I would like to think that we have made much more progress, that we've come much further, to have someone like a Donald Trump to emerge as the nominee of a major political party.

Revisionism is a healthy historiographical process, and no one, not even revisionists, should be exempt from it.

It is worth starting with visions, though, because they establish hopes and fears. History then determines which prevail.

This book [March], in my estimation, is a road map. It is a change agent. It is saying to people, "This is a way".

If someone had told me in 1963 that one day I would be in Congress, I would have said, 'You're crazy. You don't know what you're talking about.'

I think putting the United States down across the world is not something that a responsible person does.

I think [James Comey] should take a hard look at what he has done. And I think it would not be a bad thing for the American people if he did step down.

The book Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, I read it when I was about 17-and-a-half or 18. It changed my life.

Nonviolence is one of those immutable principles that we cannot and must not deviate from.

In the past the great majority of minority voters, in Ohio and other places that means African American voters, cast a large percentage of their votes during the early voting process.

Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.

[Donald Trump] is not going to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

I think right now, the focus has got to be on how we hold [Donald] Trump accountable.

I think all Americans should be hopeful, and try to be optimistic.

I don't have any extraordinary gifts. I'm just an average Joe who grew up very poor in rural Alabama.

It's going to be very difficult. I don't see the president-elect [Donald Trump] as a legitimate president.

[Donald Trump's inauguration] will be the first one that I miss since I've been in Congress. You cannot be at home with something that you feel that is wrong, is not right.

The last thing we want is a monolithic viewpoint where six people are standing before a president saying the same thing over and over again.

The lessons of nonviolence are universal. Not just for America.

President-elect [Donald] Trump won 30 of 50 states, more counties since Ronald Reagan.

DNI director [James] Clapper said as much many, many times, that there is no evidence that any outcome of the election was changed.

I think it is an imperfect arms control agreement. It's not a friendship treaty. But when America gives her word, we have to live up to it and work with our allies.