Kansas City Lightning succeeds as few biographies of jazz musicians have. . . This book is a magnificent achievement; I could hardly put it down.

In America there is institutional racism that we all inherit and participate in, like breathing the air in this room - and we have to become sensitive to it.

The story of the African-American people is the story of the settlement and growth of America itself, a universal tale that all people should experience.

The first step toward tolerance is respect and the first step toward respect is knowledge.

The thing about black history is that the truth is so much more complex than anything you could make up.

In Ethiopia, the black people became Christians 1700 years ago, hundreds of years before Northern Europe turned to Christianity... And here, most of the saints are black.

We can revolutionize the attitude of inner city brown and black kids to learning. We need a civil rights movement within the African-American community.

I want to be a figure for prison reform. I think that the criminal justice system is rotten.

Censorship is to art as lynching is to justice.

Wherever you go in the history of America, there have been Black people making contributions, but their contributions have been obscured, lost, buried.

Well, certainly one of the ironies of the success of affirmative action is that the middle class within the black community no longer lives within 'black community' by and large.

Don’t wait for a perfect person to love. Love a person and make him or her perfect with your power of love.

The sudden loss of her father was like living with a wound that would never heal, yet her memories of him were fading more and more every day.

Personal privacy is a closely held American value.

To receive honestly is the best thanks for a good thing.

The professional arsonist builds vacant lots for money.

I think people have to take responsibility for their own actions.

Thou shoreless flood, which in thy ebb and flow claspest the limits of mortality.

It bothers me when I can't, for example, remember a name. I don't know if it's pre-senility or whether there are too many names packed in our brains.

I think the best advice I'd say to any actor when you do comedy is play it straight.

We passed welfare reform. All of you know I believe we were right to do it.