Ida B. Wells - American Quotes

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Somebody must show that the Afro-American race is more sinned against than sinning, and it seems to have fallen upon me to do so.

Ida B. Wells
The mob spirit has grown with the increasing intelligence of the Afro-American.

Ida B. Wells
The miscegenation laws of the South only operate against the legitimate union of the races; they leave the white man free to seduce all the colored girls he can, but it is death to the colored man who yields to the force and advances of a similar attraction in white women. White men lynch the offending Afro-American, not because he is a despoiler of virtue, but because he succumbs to the smiles of white women.

Ida B. Wells
The only times an Afro-American who was assaulted got away has been when he had a gun and used it in self-defense.

Ida B. Wells
The South resented giving the Afro-American his freedom, the ballot box and the Civil Rights Law.

Ida B. Wells
The Afro-American is not a bestial race. If this work can contribute in any way towards proving this, and at the same time arouse the conscience of the American people to a demand for justice to every citizen, and punishment by law for the lawless, I shall feel I have done my race a service. Other considerations are of minor importance.

Ida B. Wells
Nothing is more definitively settled than he [the Black American] must act for himself. He may employ the boycott, emigration, and the press, and I feel that by a combination of all of these agencies can be effectually stamped out lynch law, that last relic of barbarism and slavery. "The gods help those who help themselves."

Ida B. Wells