It was the 31st of August in 1962 that eighteen of us traveled twenty-six miles to the county courthouse in Indianola to try to register to become first-class citizens. We was met in Indianola by policemen, Highway Patrolmen, and they only allowed two of us in to take the literacy test at the time.

Fannie Lou Hamer

Categorized in : Try Us Test Time

You can pray until you faint, but unless you get up and try to do something, God is not going to put it in your lap.

Fannie Lou Hamer

prayer christian god

Sometimes it seem like to tell the truth today is to run the risk of being killed. But if I fall, I'll fall five feet four inches forward in the fight for freedom. I'm not backing off.

Fannie Lou Hamer

religious running fall

When I liberate myself, I liberate others. If you don't speak out ain't nobody going to speak out for you.

Fannie Lou Hamer

speaks-out speak ifs

Christianity is being concerned about [others], not building a million-dollar church while people are starving right around the corner. Christ was a revolutionary person, out there where it was happening. That's what God is all about, and that's where I get my strength.

Fannie Lou Hamer

dollars church people

Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over.

Fannie Lou Hamer

bridges praise forget

Whether you have a Ph.D., or no D, we're in this bag together. And whether you're from Morehouse or Nohouse, we're still in this bag together. Not to fight to try to liberate ourselves from the men - this is another trick to get us fighting among ourselves - but to work together with the black man, then we will have a better chance to just act as human beings, and to be treated as human beings in our sick society.

Fannie Lou Hamer

sick fighting men

Nobody's free until everybody's free.

Fannie Lou Hamer

freedom inspiring peace

We have to build our own power. We have to win every single political office we can, where we have a majority of black people... The question for black people is not, when is the white man going to give us our rights, or when is he going to give us good education for our children, or when is he going to give us jobs-if the white man gives you anything-just remember when he gets ready he will take it right back. We have to take for ourselves.

Fannie Lou Hamer

winning jobs children

Black people know what white people mean when they say “law and order”.

Fannie Lou Hamer

law order mean

I feel sorry for anybody that could let hate wrap them up. Ain't no such thing as I can hate anybody and hope to see God's face.

Fannie Lou Hamer

hate sorry faces

I am sick and tired of being sick and tired.

Fannie Lou Hamer

recovery tired health

With the people, for the people, by the people. I crack up when I hear it; I say, with the handful, for the handful, by the handful, cause that's what really happens.

Fannie Lou Hamer

cracks causes people

I have just as much right to stay in America - in fact, the black people have contributed more to America than any other race, because our kids have fought here for what was called "democracy"; our mothers and fathers were sold and bought here for a price. So all I can say when they say "go back to Africa," I say "when you send the Chinese back to China, the Italians back to Italy, etc., and you get on that Mayflower from whence you came, and give the Indians their land back, who really would be here at home?"

Fannie Lou Hamer

mother home father

If I am truly free, who can tell me how much of my freedom I can have today?

Fannie Lou Hamer

i-can ifs today

I guess if I'd had any sense, I'd have been a little scared [to register to vote] - but what was the point of being scared? The only thing they could do was kill me, and it kinda seemed like they'd been trying to do that a little bit at a time since I could remember.

Fannie Lou Hamer

scared littles trying

Righteousness exalts a nation. Hate just makes people miserable.

Fannie Lou Hamer

miserable hate people

Hate won't only destroy us. It will destroy these people that's hating as well.

Fannie Lou Hamer

wells hate people

The only thing I really feel is necessary is that the black people, not only in Mississippi, will have to actually upset this applecart. What I mean by that is, so many things are under the cover that will have to be swept out and shown to this whole world, not just to America. This thing they say of "the land of the free and the home of the brave" is all on paper. It doesn't really mean anything to us. The only way we can make this thing a reality in America is to do all we can to destroy this system and bring this out to the light that has been under the cover all these years.

Fannie Lou Hamer

home mean reality

It's time for America to get right.

Fannie Lou Hamer

america

There is one thing you have got to learn about our movement. Three people are better than no people.

Fannie Lou Hamer

movement three people