You want to shut up every Negro who has the courage to stand up and fight for the rights of his people, for the rights of workers, and I have been on many a picket line for the steelworkers too.

Why should the Negroes ever fight against the only nations of the world where racial discrimination is prohibited, and where the people can live freely? Never! I can assure you, they will never fight against either the Soviet Union or the peoples' democracies.

Four hundred million in India, and millions everywhere, have told you, precisely, that the colored people are not going to die for anybody: they are going to die for their independence.

Could I say that the reason that I am here today, you know, from the mouth of the State Department itself, is: I should not be allowed to travel because I have struggled for years for the independence of the colonial peoples of Africa.

Me and my father went through a war period where we wasn't talking. He wanted me to go to theology school - I didn't want to go. I wanted to do music. I told him I was a minister through music.

Everybody should read 'Slaughterhouse-Five' by Kurt Vonnegut. This book is about the hypocrisy of war, told in satire, and is hard-hitting and truthful.

Virginia Woolf came along in the early part of the century and essentially said through her writing, yes, big books can be written about the traditional big subjects. There is war. There is the search for God. These are all very important things.

The Medicaid money that right-wingers want to snatch away from Planned Parenthood actually goes toward critical preventative care and treatments for the disadvantaged. So if pro-life activists are genuine in wanting to preserve human lives, waging a war against clinics that help low-income men and women isn't the way to go.