Carter G. Woodson Quotes

You must give your own story to the world.

Those who have no record of what their forebears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history.

If Liberia has failed, then, it is no evidence of the failure of the Negro in government. It is merely evidence of the failure of slavery.

We have a wonderful history behind us. … If you are unable to demonstrate to the world that you have this record, the world will say to you, ‘You are not worthy to enjoy the blessings of democracy or anything else’.

I am not afraid of being sued by white businessmen. In fact, I should welcome such a law suit.

This crusade is much more important than the anti- lynching movement, because there would be no lynching if it did not start in the schoolroom.

Even schools for Negroes, then, are places where they must be convinced of their inferiority.

The oppressor has always indoctrinated the weak with his interpretation of the crimes of the strong.

Negro banks, as a rule, have failed because the people, taught that their own pioneers in business cannot function in this sphere, withdrew their deposits.

The strongest bank in the United States will last only so long as the people will have sufficient confidence in it to keep their money there.

I am ready to act, if I can find brave men to help me.

Negroes who have been so long inconvenienced and denied opportunities for development are naturally afraid of anything that sounds like discrimination.

If the Negro in the ghetto must eternally be fed by the hand that pushes him into the ghetto, he will never become strong enough to get out of the ghetto.

If the white man wants to hold on to it, let him do so; but the Negro, so far as he is able, should develop and carry out a program of his own.

The mere imparting of information is not education. Above all things, the effort must result in making a man think and do for himself.

The real servant of the people must live among them, think with them, feel for them, and die for them.

What we need is not a history of selected races or nations, but the history of the world void of national bias, race hate, and religious prejudice.