Marian Wright Edelman
If things are too easy, life is a whole lot less interesting.
I worry about the kids who have too much. As a parent living in a so-called good neighborhood with children who went to private high school, I found myself spending much time in parent groups worrying about alcohol, unsupervised parties, and parents not being parents.
So much of the deep lingering sadness over President Kennedy's assassination is about the unfinished promise: unspoken speeches, unfulfilled hopes, the wondering about what might have been.
When President Kennedy was elected, many black Americans, like so many Americans, were captivated by his youth and energy and promise and were especially hopeful that he might move the country in a new direction on civil rights.
Our true remembrance to President Kennedy is in our actions to honor the unspoken words and finish the unfinished work today and tomorrow and for as long as it takes.
The key is that your children are aware that you love them a lot, and that you are there when they really, really need you. If a kid was ill, I would simply leave a meeting and go home.
I need to work outside government, on my own.
It never occurred to me that I was not going to challenge segregation.
I hadn't planned on going to law school. I wanted to study 19th-century Russian literature.
Children must have at least one person who believes in them. It could be a counselor, a teacher, a preacher, a friend. It could be you. You never know when a little love, a little support will plant a small seed of hope.Collection: Teacher
The question is not whether we can afford to invest in every child; it is whether we can afford not to.Collection: Children
Be real. Try to do what you say, say what you mean, and be what you seem.Collection: Real
It is so important not to let ourselves off the hook or to become apathetic or cynical by telling ourselves that nothing works or makes a difference. Every day, light your small candle.... The inaction and actions of many human beings over a long time contributed to the crises our children face, and it is the action and struggle of many human beings over time that will solve them-with God's help. So every day, light your small candle.Collection: Children
Be a good ancestor. Stand for something bigger than yourself. Add value to the Earth during your sojourn.Collection: Add
It's time for greatness - not for greed. It's a time for idealism - not ideology. It is a time not just for compassionate words, but compassionate action.Collection: Greatness
Investing in [children] is not a national luxury or a national choice. It's a national necessity. If the foundation of your house is crumbling, you don't say you can't afford to fix it while you're building astronomically expensive fences to protect it from outside enemies. The issue is not are we going to pay - it's are we going to pay now, up front, or are we going to pay a whole lot more later on.Collection: Children
Never let us confuse what is legal with what is right. Everything Hitler did in Nazi Germany was legal, but it was not right.Collection: Law
You were born God's original. Try not to become someone's copy.Collection: Trying
Failure is just another way to learn how to do something right.Collection: Inspirational
Don't just dream about grandiose acts of doing good. Every day do small ones, that add up over time to positive patterns.Collection: Inspirational
Dr. King used to say, 'I was sitting in the back of the bus, but my mind was always up front.' Don't let anybody tell you that you can't do it. You aim high and you work very hard and now I think it's clear that you can be anything you want to.Collection: Inspirational
Education remains one of the black community's most enduring values. It is sustained by the belief that freedom and education go hand in hand, that learning and training are essential to economic quality and independence.Collection: Hands
Don't assume a door is closed; push on it. Don't assume if it was closed yesterday that it is closed today. Don't ever stop learning and improving your mind. If you do, you're going to be left behind.Collection: Doors
If we think we have ours and don't owe any time or money or effort to help those left behind, then we are a part of the problem rather than the solution to the fraying social fabric that threatens all Americans and the very dream that is America.Collection: Peace
We must serve consciously as caring role models, emphasizing the ethic of service, not consumption.Collection: Caring
It is [children] who are God's presence, promise and hope for mankind.Collection: Children
The civil-rights movement was completely impossible to achieve. But look at what ordinary people were able to do because they were willing to sacrifice their lives to stay with it. They didn't expect a political process to respond to them. They made the political process respond to them. To say "It's so bad I won't bother" is to give up on your children and give up on your future.Collection: Children
You can achieve much in life if you don't mind doing the work and giving someone else the credit.Collection: Giving
You just do it one step at a time.Collection: Steps
In trying to make a big difference, don't ignore the small daily differences we can make.Collection: Differences
The legacy I want to leave is a child-care system that says that no kid is going to be left alone or left unsafe.Collection: Children
So much of America's tragic and costly failure to care for all its children stems from our tendency to distinguish between our own children and other people's children--as if justice were divisible.Collection: Children
Homeless shelters, child hunger, and child suffering have become normalized in the richest nation on earth. It's time to reset our moral compass and redefine how we measure success.Collection: Children
If parents snicker at racial and gender jokes, another generation will pass on the poison adults still have not had the courage to snuff out.Collection: Family
The literacy level at Mississippi prisons? Fifth grade. Can't read, what are you going to do? If you've got a conviction rap, what are you going to do? It's a real crisis.Collection: Real
When Jesus Christ asked little children to come to him, he didn't say only rich children, or White children, or children with two-parent families, or children who didn't have a mental or physical handicap. He said, Let all children come unto me.Collection: Jesus
It is the responsibility of every adult... to make sure that children hear what we have learned from the lessons of life and to hear over and over that we love them and that they are not alone.Collection: Education
I was taught that the world had a lot of problems; that I could struggle and change them; that intellectual and material gifts brought the privilege and responsibility of sharing with others less fortunate; and that service is the rent each of us pays for living - the very purpose of life and not something you do in your spare time or after you have reached your personal goals.Collection: Struggle
It is utterly exhausting being Black in America - physically, mentally, and emotionally. While many minority groups and women feel similar stress, there is no respite or escape from your badge of color.Collection: Stress
It really takes a community to raise children, no matter how much money one has. Nobody can do it well alone. And it's the bedrock security of community that we and our children need.Collection: Children
Understand and be confident that each of us can make a difference by caring and acting in small as well as big ways.Collection: Caring
You'd better stay determined, because that's how our ancestors got us where we are.Collection: Determined
No time is ever wasted if you have a book along as a companion.Collection: Book
You are in charge of your own attitude whatever others do or circumstances you face. The only person you can control is yourself...worry more about your attitude than your aptitude or lineage.Collection: Gratitude
There are so many noises and pulls and competing demands in our lives that many of us never find out who we are. Learn to be quiet enough to hear the sound of the genuine within yourself so that you can hear it in other people.Collection: People
There are levels of outrage, and there's a point at which you can't be trespassed upon anymore.Collection: Racism
Why are guns the only unregulated consumer products in America? We regulate toy guns and teddy bears, but we do not regulate a product that kills 4,600 children a year.Collection: Children
We're spending, on average, three times more for prison than for public-school pupils. That's the dumbest investment policy. It doesn't make us safer.Collection: School
Character, self-discipline, determination, attitude and service are the substance of life.Collection: Determination