Top 18 Rosa Parks Quotes

I have been refused entrance on the buses because I would not pay my fare at the front and go around to the rear door to enter. That was the custom if the bus was crowded up to the point where the white passengers would start occupying.

I had felt for a long time that, if I was ever told to get up so a white person could sit, that I would refuse to do so.

All I was doing was trying to get home from work.

Memories of our lives, of our works and our deeds will continue in others.

It was not pre-arranged. It just happened that the driver made a demand and I just didn’t feel like obeying his demand. I was quite tired after spending a full day working.

God has always given me the strength to say what is right.

Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and, hopefully, we shall overcome.

You spend your whole lifetime in your occupation, actually making life clever, easy and convenient for white people. But when you have to get transportation home, you are denied an equal accommodation. Our existence was for the white man’s comfort and well-being; we had to accept being deprived of just being human.

I’m tired of being treated like a second-class citizen.

As far back as I can remember, I knew there was something wrong with our way of life when people could be mistreated because of the color of their skin.

I have learned over the years that when one’s mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.

I have never been what you would call just an integrationist. I know I’ve been called that… Integrating that bus wouldn’t mean more equality. Even when there was segregation, there was plenty of integration in the South, but it was for the benefit and convenience of the white person, not us.

Each person must live their life as a model for others.

I would like to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free… so other people would be also free.

Let us look at Jim Crow for the criminal he is and what he has done to one life multiplied millions of times over these United States and the world. He walks us on a tightrope from birth.

There is just so much hurt, disappointment, and oppression one can take… The line between reason and madness grows thinner.

Whites would accuse you of causing trouble when all you were doing was acting like a normal human being instead of cringing.

I don’t think well of people who are prejudiced against people because of race. The only way for prejudiced people to change is for them to decide for themselves that all human beings should be treated fairly. We can’t force them to think that way.