Political Quotes

“I want to appreciate the remarks that Sheila Jackson Lee has just made, and I thank my colleagues for giving me this opportunity to speak out of order. And the reason I rise is that there are very few people that have been active in the civil rights movement. They all came after Dorothy Height. She was there before Adam Powell, Martin Luther King, Jim Farmer, and all of the great civil rights leaders that have made the struggle. She's been made a confidante from Franklin Roosevelt to President Obama and all of the Presidents that have been in between. She gave so much of herself without even talking about color, without just talking about women, but most of all in talking about humankind. She was a true believer that if America really did what it was supposed to do to the brothers and sisters and the citizens that made up this great country, then fairness and equity would determine that all people are truly treated equally. And even though she wasn't born in the city of New York, we are so proud that she went to New York University--even though she was turned down with a scholarship at Barnard College--that she stayed there and she worked in our Harlem YMCA, that she was confidante to Congressman Adam Clayton Powell at his church and even counseled his father, who was the pastor before him. Time is going to record that there have been a lot of people who have struggled to make this country all that she can be.…”