Quote

The challenges African-Americans are facing today are rooted in the system of slavery.

Wealthy men, too, like several of those in our neighborhood, had so many slaves that they were compelled to buy other plantations on which to employ them.

It is over one hundred years since the abolition of slavery. The Negro people in the United States have taken plenty and they have reached a stage where they have decided that they are not going to take any more.

Slavery in West Africa, and in Rome and in the Mediterranean, was something different than slavery in America.

In 1790 we had less than eight hundred thousand slaves. Under our mild and humane administration of the system they have increased above four millions.

White Americans believe we've made more progress since the end of slavery in 1865 than do black Americans for whom '12 Years a Slave' documents a collective memory, passed down in the genes and by the lore of generations.

Many African-American men are incarcerated. And so African-American women do carry an enormous burden. And traditionally have carried a greater burden than perhaps their white counterparts.

Was it not enough punishment and suffering in history that we were uprooted and made helpless slaves not only in new colonial outposts but also domestically.

Ninety years after slavery, blacks were still segregated from whites. They still had separate drinking fountains, separate restrooms, separate neighborhoods, and separate schools. They still were expected to sit at the back of the bus.

Slavery is something that is all too often swept under the carpet.