Ella Baker Quotes

In order to see where we are going, we not only must remember where we have been, but we must understand where we have been.

Oppressed people, whatever their level of formal education, have the ability to understand and interpret the world around them, to see the world for what it is, and move to transform it.

I have always thought that what is needed is the development of people who are interested not in being leaders as much as in developing leadership in others.

Until the killing of black men, black mothers' sons, becomes as important to the rest of the country as the killing of a white mother's sons, we who believe in freedom cannot rest until this happens.

Remember, we are not fighting for the freedom of the Negro alone, but for the freedom of the human spirit a larger freedom that encompasses all mankind.

We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it comes.

Give light, and people will find the way...

I didn't break the rules, but I challenged the rules.

My theory is, strong people don't need strong leaders.

One of the things that has to be faced is the process of waiting to change the system, how much we have got to do to find out who we are, where we have come from and where we are going.

I came out of a family background that involved itself with people.

I think you can find some rationales for that if we look at the background out of which he came. Martin [Luther King] had come out of a highly competitive, black, middle-class background.

I've never credited myself with a professional life. But, basically, it has been that.

Strong people do not need strong leaders.

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee was more politically oriented. Part and parcel of the initial SNCC efforts was to not only go in for voter registration, but for political participation.

During the Depression years, I began to identify to some extent with the unemployed, the organization for the unemployed at that period.

[Martin Luther] King was one of the two young ministers - and you know how directly oriented the Negro community still is towards the minister as the leader.

Martin [Luther King] wasn't one to buck forces too much.

When I came out of the Depression, I came out of it with a different point of view as to what constituted success. And that was even just even personal success.

I guess the best way to describe that would be to connect with the fact that I came out of college just before the big Depression, and I came to New York.

[Walter White] was also one of the best lobbyist of the period.

I had been friendly with people who were in the Communist party and all the rest of the Left forces, which were oriented in the direction of mass action.

Give light and people will find the way.

Strong people don't need strong leaders.

[Our children] had the privilege of growing up where they'd raised a lot of food. They were never hungry. They could share their food with people. And so you share your lives with people.

The major job was getting people to understand that they had something within their power that they could use.