Fanie Lou Hamer Quotes

Mrs. (Fanie Lou) Hamer, like her mother, also kept weapons nearby in case she needed them: 'I keep a shotgun in every corner of my bedroom & the first cracker even looks like he wants to throw some dynamite on my porch won't write his mama again. ~ Charles E. Cobb Jr.

With the people, for the people, by the people. I crack up when I hear it; I say, with the handful, for the handful, by the handful, cause that's what really happens. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

But you see now baby, whether you have a ph.d., d.d. or no d, we're in this bag together. And whether you are from Morehouse or Nohouse, we,re still in this bag together. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

The methods used to take human lives, such as abortion, the pill, the ring, etc., amounts to genocide. I believe that legal abortion is legal murder ... ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

You don't have to like everybody, but you have to love everybody. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer, a sharecropper in Ruleville, Mississippi, became legendary as organizer and speaker. She sang hymns; she walked picket lines with her familiar limp (as a child she contracted polio). She roused people to excitement at mass meetings: "I'm sick an' tired o' bein' sick an' tired! ~ Howard Zinn

White Americans today don't know what in the world to do because when they put us behind them, that's where they made their mistake ... they put us behind them, and we watched every move they made. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

To support whatever is right, and to bring in justice where weve had so much injustice. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

You know I'm not hung up on this liberating myself from the "black" man - I'm not going to try that thing. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

We didn't come all the way up here to compromise for no more than we'd gotten here. We didn't come all this way for no two seats, 'cause all of us is tired. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

A black woman's body was never hers alone. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

I was just an infant when [Fannie Lou] Hamer spoke - barley even awake in the world. But here she was, pressing the Democratic Party to refuse to recognize the all-white Mississippi delegation, because obviously there was no way Mississippi could have an all-white delegation. Black people had been kept from registering through violence and intimidation. She had experienced that violence herself and was there to speak about it and to insist the delegation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party be recognized instead. ~ Leah D. Daughtry

We serve God by serving our fellow man; kids are suffering from malnutrition. People are going to the fields hungry. If you are a Christian, we are tired of being mistreated. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

When they asked for those to raise their hands who'd go down to the courthouse the next day, I raised mine. Had it high up as I could get it. I guess if I'd had any sense I'd've been a little scared, but what was the point of being scared? The only thing they could do to me was kill me and it seemed like they'd been trying to do that a little bit at a time ever since I could remember. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

If I fall, I will fall five-feet four-inches forward in the fight for freedom. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Our foreparents were mostly brought from West Africa. We were brought to America and our foreparents were sold; white people bo ught them; white people changed their names my maiden name is supposed to be Townsend, but really, what is my maiden name? What is my name? ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Christianity is being concerned about [others], not building a million-dollar church while people are starving right around the corner. Christ was a revolutionary person, out there where it was happening. That's what God is all about, and that's where I get my strength. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

When I liberate others, I liberate myself. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

I just think of Fannie Lou Hamer, because even though she didn't know my name Ms. Hamer was thinking of me. I just want to do a good job, because I want her to look over that edge of heaven and say, "That's why I did it. That's why. I knew we had the capacity and the talent to be everything America says we can't be. All we needed was an open door." ~ Leah D. Daughtry

I don't want equal rights with the white man; if I did, I'd be a thief and a murderer. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

[On her Freedom Farm Cooperative:] If you give a hungry man food, he will eat it. [But] if you give him land, he will grow his own food. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

It's time for America to get right. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Every red stripe in that flag represents the black man's blood that has been shed. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Whether you have a Ph.D., or no D, we're in this bag together. And whether you're from Morehouse or Nohouse, we're still in this bag together. Not to fight to try to liberate ourselves from the men - this is another trick to get us fighting among ourselves - but to work together with the black man, then we will have a better chance to just act as human beings, and to be treated as human beings in our sick society. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

I feel sorry for anybody that could let hate wrap them up. Ain't no such thing as I can hate anybody and hope to see God's face. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

I feel sorry for anybody who would let hate wrap them up. Ain't no such thing as I can hate anybody and hope to see God's face.
- Fannie Lou Townsend Hamer ~ Deborah Wiles

I am determined to get every Negro in the state of Mississippi registered. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

It is only when we speak what is right that we stand a chance at night of being blown to bits in our homes. Can we call this a free country, when I am afraid to go to sleep in my own home in Mississippi? ... I might not live two hours after I get back home, but I want to be a part of setting the Negro free in Mississippi. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

Marriage equality is a very middle-class issue and voting rights is a very working-class issue. If you do not vote, who are you speaking for? Who will be the next Fannie Lou Hamer? If not you or someone you know, then who? ~ Darryl Pinckney

Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

You can pray until you faint, but unless you get up and try to do something, God is not going to put it in your lap. ~ Fannie Lou Hamer

All of this is on account we want to register [sic], to become first-class citizens, and if the Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America. Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hooks because our lives be threatened daily because we want to live as decent human beings - in America? ~ Fannie Lou Hamer