Thurgood Marshall

"We must demand not the crumbs from the table of justice, but a seat at the table itself."

"The Constitution is not a relic of the past; it is a living promise to the future."

"A fair legal system requires fair-minded people, and that means judges who understand that justice must serve all."

"Our greatest strength as a nation lies not in our military, but in our moral convictions."

"The path to equality is paved with the determination of those who refuse to accept injustice."

"Education opens the prison doors of poverty and prejudice."

"We cannot build a better tomorrow while ignoring the injustices of today."

"The law must protect the least among us with the same vigor it protects the mighty."

"Your life's work should be a reflection of your deepest convictions."

"Compromise on principle is the first step toward defeat."

"The Constitution's promise of equal protection is a debt to the future that we must pay today."

"A nation that forgets its history is doomed to repeat its mistakes."

"The Constitution doesn't say everybody. It says 'we the people.' We have to expand the meaning of those words."

"Slavery did not mean love of the southern white people for the black. It meant the opposite."

"A child born to a Black mother in a state like Mississippi has exactly the same rights as a white child born to the President of the United States."

"Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire in the minds of our young people."

"In every conceivable manner, the family is link to our past, bridge to our future, and bond to one another."

"Don't just get involved. Fight for your seat at the table. Better yet, fight for a seat at the head of the table."

"Anybody can sit in the front of the bus if they just stand up."

"The mark of a great nation is not the things it builds with stone and steel, but the character of its people."

"None of us got where we are solely by pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps."

"I wish I could say that racism and prejudice were only distant memories. We must dissent from the indifference."

"Gideon's Trumpet has not been forgotten. Nor should it be. A right without remedy is no right at all."

"I believe that the Constitution's real promise lies in its capacity for growth and change."

"The real problem is that we have a lower class which is a dependent class, living on poverty or living on welfare."

"I get to this point, and I think that's what we need to do, come hell or high water, this is our life."

"You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. This becomes your excuse or your opportunity."

"The segregation of schools is as evil as segregation anywhere else."

"I made up my mind not to cry any more. We're men."

"Unless we do something to change the course we're on, we're going down the wrong road."