Coretta Scott King Quotes

We have an historic opportunity for a great global healing and renewal. If we will accept the challenge of nonviolent activism with faith, courage, and determination, we can bring this great vision of a world united in peace and harmony from a distant ideal into glowing reality.

I believe all Americans who believe in freedom, tolerance and human rights have a responsibility to oppose bigotry and prejudice based on sexual orientation.

Segmentation was wrong when it was forced by white people, and I believe it is still wrong when it is requested by black people.

If American women increase their voting turnout by ten percent, I think we would see an end to all of the budget cuts in programs benefiting women and children.

Struggle is a never ending process. Freedom is never really won, you earn it and win it in every generation.

When you are willing to make sacrifices for a great cause, you will never be alone.

I must remind you that starving a child is violence. Neglecting school children is violence. Punishing a mother and her family is violence. Discrimination against a working man is violence. Ghetto housing is violence. Ignoring medical need is violence. Contempt for poverty is violence.

Money is necessary
both to support a family and to advance causes one believes in.

When Good Friday comes, these are the moments in life when we feel there's no hope. But then, Easter comes.

How many men must die before we can really have a free and true and peaceful society? How long will it take?

Mama and Daddy King represent the best in manhood and womanhood, the best in a marriage, the kind of people we are trying to become.

It's going to take an act of Congress to deal with poverty and hunger, not only in this country, but throughout the world. We have the resources but we don't have the will.

If you give your life to a cause in which you believe, and if it is right and just, and if your life comes to an end as a result of this, then your life could not have been spent in a more redemptive way. I think that is what my husband has done.

Love is such a powerful force. It's there for everyone to embrace-that kind of unconditional love for all of humankind. That is the kind of love that impels people to go into the community and try to change conditions for others, to take risks for what they believe in.

If a man had nothing that was worth dying for, then he was not fit to live.

We must eliminate the gulf of mistrust and ignorance that keeps us from learning from each other.

Women, in general, are not part of the corruption of the past, so they can give a new kind of leadership, a new image for mankind.

Because Dr. King was human and not divine - although we think he was divine, he was just a man, an extraordinary man, but a man - and he would get depressed from time to time and disappointed about all kinds of things relative to the movement.

Hate is too great a burden to bear. It injures the hater more than it injures the hated.

Violence diminishes our humanity.

Justice is never advanced in the taking of human life.

Without Coretta Scott King, there would not have been a Martin Luther King, Jr. in the way that we know him.

For many years now, I have been an outspoken supporter of civil and human rights for gay and lesbian people. Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in Montgomery, Selma, in Albany, Ga. and St. Augustine, Fla., and many other campaigns of the Civil Rights Movement. Many of these courageous men and women were fighting for my freedom at a time when they could find few voices for their own, and I salute their contributions.

Like life, racial understanding is not something that we find but something that we must create. And so the ability of Negroes and whites to work together, to understand each other, will not be found readymade; it must be created by the fact of contact.

All we seek is an America where every person is given the chance to productively contribute to his country and where he can receive a fair and equitable share of the wealth that production creates.

An evil deed is not redeemed by an evil deed in retaliation.

Hate is too great a burden to bear ...

There is a spirit and a need and a man at the beginning of every great human advance. Every one of these must be right for that particular moment in history or nothing happens.

Nonviolence first changes the individual.

Nonviolence is a method that transforms, first of all, the individual once you understand it and embrace it. It begins with you and, if you can, about transforming individuals so that they love unconditionally.

Freedom and justice cannot be parceled out in pieces to suit political convenience. I don't believe you can stand for freedom for one group of people and deny it to others.

Lesbian and gay people are a permanent part of the American workforce, who currently have no protection from the arbitrary abuse of their rights on the job.

Isn't it strange how the leaders of nations can talk so eloquently about peace while they prepare for war? ... There is no way to make peace while preparing for war.

No abundance of material goods can compensate for the death of individuality and personal creativity.

When the heart is right, the mind and the body will follow.

I always knew that I was called to do something. I didn't know what, but I finally rationalized after I met Martin [Luther King, Jr.] and it took a lot of praying to discover this, that this was probably what God had called me to do, to marry him.

People need role models. They need to see examples of people in peoples' lives.

I am convinced that the women of the world, united without any regard for national or racial dimensions, can become a most powerful force for international peace and brotherhood.

The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members.

I still hear people say that I should not be talking about the rights of lesbian and gay people and I should stick to the issue of racial justice. But I hasten to remind them that Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' I appeal to everyone who believes in Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream to make room at the table of brother- and sisterhood for lesbian and gay people.

If sexual relations between consenting adults are not part of the right to privacy guaranteed by the Constitution, then American democracy is in trouble.