"When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist." -- Dom Helder Camara

" Often the oppressor goes along unaware of the evil involved in his oppression so long as the oppressed accepts it. " -- Martin Luther King, Jr.

"The only way to make sure people you agree with can speak is to support the rights of people you don't agree with. -- Eleanor Holmes Norton

"Be as beneficent as the sun or the sea, but if your rights as a rational being are trenched on, die on the first inch of your territory. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"I shall be honored to go to jail. Under a dictatorship, the detention cell is a place of honor. -- Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago (Philippines)

"I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue. -- Barry Goldwater

"I am not interested in picking up crumbs of compassion thrown from the table of someone who considers himself my master. I want the full menu of rights. -- Bishop Desmond Tutu, quoted in You Said a Mouthful edited by Ronald D. Fuchs

"It is often easier to become outraged by injustice half a world away than by oppression and discrimination half a block from home. -- Carl T. Rowan

"Silence never won rights. They are not handed down from above; they are forced by pressures from below. -- Roger Baldwin