“Even in terms of breaking down the barriers of segregation, there is still much to be done. It may be true, as I just said, figuratively speaking that old man segregation is on his deathbed. But history has proven that social systems have a great last-minute breathing power, and the guardians of the status quo are always on hand with their oxygen tents to keep the old order alive. And so segregation is still with us. We still confront it in the South in its glaring and conspicuous forms. We still confront it in every other section of this country in its hidden and subtle forms. But if democracy is to live, segregation must die, for racial segregation is a cancer in the body politic. Segregation must be removed before our moral and democratic health can be realized.”

— Martin Luther King, Jr.

1960s, Address to Cornell College (1962)

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Martin Luther King, Jr. 658

American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Ci… 1929–1968

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“Racial segregation must be seen for what it is — and that is an evil system, a new form of slavery covered up with certain niceties of complexity. […] Segregation is evil because it relegates persons to the status of things. […] And segregation is evil because it stigmatizes the segregated as an untouchable in a caste system. We’ve been in the mountain of segregation long enough and it is time for all men of goodwill to say now, “We are through with segregation now, henceforth, and forever more.””

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Keep Moving From This Mountain (1965)
Context: And now it is time for us to move on to that great and noble realm of justice and brotherhood. That is the great struggle taking place in our nation today. It isn’t a struggle just based on a lot of noise; it is a struggle to save the soul of our nation for no nation can rise to its full moral maturity so long as it subjects a segment of its citizenry on the basis of race or color. And somehow we must come to see more than ever before that racial injustice is a cancer in the body politic which must be removed before our moral health can be realized. Racial segregation must be seen for what it is — and that is an evil system, a new form of slavery covered up with certain niceties of complexity. [... ] Segregation is evil because it relegates persons to the status of things. [... ] And segregation is evil because it stigmatizes the segregated as an untouchable in a caste system. We’ve been in the mountain of segregation long enough and it is time for all men of goodwill to say now, “We are through with segregation now, henceforth, and forever more.”

“The South was very segregated. I mean, all through my childhood, long after Jim Crow was supposed to not be in existence, it was still a very segregated South. And the town we lived in - Nicholtown, which was a small community within Greenville, S. C.”

Jacqueline Woodson (1963) American writer

was an all-black community. And people still lived very segregated lives, I think, because that was all they had always known. And there was still this kind of danger to integrating. So people kind of stayed in the places - the safe places that they had always known.
On still experiencing the aftereffects of segregation in “Jacqueline Woodson On Growing Up, Coming Out And Saying Hi To Strangers” https://www.npr.org/2016/10/14/497953254/jacqueline-woodson-on-growing-up-coming-out-and-saying-hi-to-strangers in NPR (2016 Oct 14)

“It is very appropriate that from this cradle of the Confederacy, this very heart of the great Anglo-Saxon Southland, that today we sound the drum for freedom as have our generations of forebears before us time and again down through history. Let us rise to the call for freedom-loving blood that is in us and send our answer to the tyranny that clanks its chains upon the South. In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny, and I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow and segregation forever.”

George Wallace (1919–1998) 45th Governor of Alabama

First Inaugural Speech as Governor of Alabama, (January 1963)
1960s

“Segregation was wrong when it was forced by white people, and I believe it is still wrong when it is requested by black people.”

Coretta Scott King (1927–2006) American author, activist, and civil rights leader. Wife of Martin Luther King, Jr.

As quoted in The Last Word : A Treasury of Women's Quotes (1992), by Carolyn Warner, p. 99

“You have the choice to be governed by those who aim to keep us segregated in racial compartments so they can continue to enjoy their privileged status in society, at your expense.”

Mahendra Chaudhry (1942) Fijian politician

Address to the conference of the Fiji Labour Party, Lautoka, 31 July 2005

“The history of the Democrat party is one of slavery, secession, segregation, and now socialism.”

Allen West (politician) (1961) American politician; retired United States Army officer

2010s, Slavery, secession, segregation, and socialism (2010)

“So we get to the fountain, my brother and I, and we look around, there wasn't a lot of people there and I said to my brother, "You go first." He tasted the white water and then we looked around and says, "Your turn." We tasted — I taste the white water. Then we both taste the colored water, and we looked at each other, six and seven years old. The water tastes the same! What's the big deal? We had not been taught segregation at the age of six and seven. We wondered what the big deal was about.
Now, that being said and growing in the segregated South, I am not mad at America. I don't have a grudge against America, because one of the things that has made this nation great in the short 235-year history, Sean, is its ability to change. A lot of other countries don't have that ability. We ought to be appreciative of the fact that this country has that kind of resilience.”

Herman Cain (1945) American writer, businessman and activist

“You marked the minutes," the old man said. "But did you use them wisely? To be still? To cherish? To be grateful? To lift and be lifted?”

Mitch Albom (1958) American author

Source: The Time Keeper

“Perhaps the most insidious and least understood form of segregation is that of the word. […] For if the word has the potency to revive and make us free, it has also the power to blind, imprison and destroy.”

Ralph Ellison (1914–1994) American novelist, literary critic, scholar and writer

"Twentieth-Century Fiction and the Black Mask of Humanity" (1953), in The Collected Essays, ed. John F. Callahan (New York: Modern Library, 1995), p. 81.

“The principle of segregation of the White and Negro races in the South is so well known that it requires no definition. Briefly and plainly stated, the object of this policy is to prevent the two races from meeting on terms of social equality. By established practice, each race maintains its own institutions and promotes its own social life.”

Theodore G. Bilbo (1877–1947) American politician

Source: Take Your Choice, Separation or Mongrelization (1946), Chapter Four: Southern Segregation and the Color Line.

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Martin Luther King, Jr. 658

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