I Have A Dream Speech Quotes:

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: Despair, Valleys, I Have A Dream Speech

So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: July, I Have A Dream Speech, Hampshire, Soul Force, July 4th 1776

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Love, Life, Marriage, Love And Hate, Kings And Love

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: Speech at Civil Rights March,Washington, D.C., 28 Aug. 1963

topic: Dream, Children, Integrity, Good Character, Social Equality

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed; We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Dream, Equality, Men, Inspirational Patriotic, Equality For All

We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: March, Turns, Walks, I Have A Dream Speech

Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Children, Reality, Justice, Soul Force, Gradualism

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Change, Night, Light, Beacons, Proclamation

And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: Speech at Civil Rights March in Washington, 28 Aug. 1963, in New York Times 29 Aug. 1963, p. 21

topic: Dream, Today, Faces, I Had A Dream, Today And Tomorrow

We refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Believe, Justice, Refuse, Soul Force, Kings Speech

The reason I can't follow the old eye-for-an-eye philosophy is that it ends up leaving everyone blind.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Philosophy, Eye, Leaving, Old Eyes, Eye For An Eye

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: Brother, Destiny, White, Militancy, I Have A Dream Speech

We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Inspirational, Relationship, Inspiring, Love And Hate, Forgive Yourself

I, with millions of other Americans, have the same dream Martin Luther King Jr. had; when I wake up I wish some of the things I dreamt would be true. I wish that little black and white boys and girls would hold hands without being shocked at their nearness to each other and say in a natural way, "we have overcome.

- Maya Angelou

topic: Girl, Dream, Kings, Holding Hands, Anti Racist

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men - yes, black men as well as white men - would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness... America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: Fall, Men, Pursuit Of Happiness, Life Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness, Unalienable Rights

In some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Stars, Shining, Brotherhood, Kings Speech, Birmingham

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Color, America, People, Kings Speech, Insufficient

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Believe, Opportunity, America, Soul Force, Kings Speech

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Cells, Wind, Creative, Tribulation, Police Brutality

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Real, Luxury, America, Soul Force, Urgency

From the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire, let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York, let freedom ring. From the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania, let freedom ring. But not only that: Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: New York, Freedom, Mountain, Soul Force, July 4th 1776

Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Inspirational, Peace, Freedom, Make Peace Not War, Spiritual Thirst

I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Inspirational, Life, Dream, I Have A Dream Speech

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.

- Elizabeth Cady Stanton

topic: Inspiring, Women, Equality, Social Equality, Social Groups

Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Soul, Height, Majestic, Soul Force, Peace Justice

We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Life, Motivational, Wisdom, Antithesis, World Religions

Dr. King gave the "I have a dream" speech, not the "I have a plan" speech.

- Simon Sinek

source: Simon Sinek @simonsinek, twitter.com. January 19, 2015.

topic: Dream, Kings, Speech, I Have A Dream Speech

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: God, Spiritual, Children, Joining Hands, Kings Speech

We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Water, Justice, Satisfied, Dissatisfaction, I Have A Dream Speech

When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: Speech at Civil Rights March,Washington, D.C., 28 Aug. 1963

topic: Fall, Independence, Republic, Kings Speech, Signing

Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: Dark, Justice, Path, Soul Force, Kings Speech

We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.

- Martin Luther

topic: Believe, Opportunity, Vaults, Soul Force, Kings Speech

Nobody black had learned anything from the Letter from the Birmingham Jail or from the I Have a Dream speech. That was a revelation of white people.

- Andrew Young

topic: Dream, White, Jail, Birmingham, I Have A Dream Speech

In its essence, Martin Luther King Jr.'s ‘I Have a Dream' speech is one citizen's soul-searing plea with his countrymen––Whites and Blacks––to recognize that racial disparities fueled by unwarranted bigotry were crippling America's ability to shine as a true beacon of democracy in a world filled with people groping their way through suffocating shadows of political turmoil, economic oppression, military mayhem, starvation, and disease.

- Aberjhani

topic: Dream, Kings, Military, Political Turmoil, I Have A Dream Speech

It was so crucial to the Civil Rights Movement that on June 23, 1963, Martin Luther King came to town, walked down Woodward Avenue with more than 100,000 people and delivered the first major public iteration of his "I Have A Dream" speech, two months before he did it in Washington.

- David Maraniss

source: "Super Bowl Commercial Inspires Maraniss To Write About Detroit's Better Times". "Morning Edition" with David Greene, www.npr.org. January 14, 2016.

topic: Dream, Kings, June, Two Months, I Have A Dream Speech

Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope.

- Martin Luther

topic: Mountain, Despair, Stones, Memorial Stone, Kings Speech

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Inspirational, Motivational, Inspiring, Love And Hate, Darfur

In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: "The Trumpet of Conscience". Martin Luther King, Jr.'s steeler lecture at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, November 17, 1957.

topic: Friendship, Wisdom, Clever, Sounds Of Silence, Meaningful Friendship

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Wisdom, Peace, Freedom, Social Equality, Social Injustice

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Dream, Peace, One Day, Kings Speech, Exalted

The sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

source: I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

topic: Summer, Autumn, Equality, Invigorating, Discontentment

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit together at the table of brotherhood.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Dream, Son, Equality, Mississippi, Masters And Slaves

Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Inspirational, Life, God, Inspirational Freedom, Kings Speech

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

topic: Struggle, Discipline, Creative, Non Violence, Physical Violence