Top 100 John Lewis Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “If you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have a moral obligation to do something about it.”

— John Lewis

2. “We may not have chosen the time, but the time has chosen us.”

— John Lewis

3. “But you have to have hope. You have to be optimistic in order to continue to move forward.”

— John Lewis

4. “Don’t give up! Don’t give in! Keep the faith! And keep your eyes on the prize!”

— John Lewis

5. “You cannot be afraid to speak up and speak out for what you believe. You have to have courage, raw courage.”

— John Lewis

6. “If you’re not hopeful and optimistic, then you just give up. You have to take that long hard look and just believe that if your consistent, you will succeed.”

— John Lewis

7. “The civil rights movement was based on faith. Many of us who were participants in this movement saw our involvement as an extension of our faith. We saw ourselves doing the work of the Almighty. Segregation and racial discrimination were not in keeping with our faith, so we had to do something.”

— John Lewis

8. “I believe in nonviolence as a way of life, as a way of living.”

— John Lewis

9. “The reward for playing jazz is playing jazz.”

— John Lewis

10. “When people tell me nothing has changed, I say come walk in my shoes and I will show you change.”

— John Lewis

11. “You have to have the capacity and the ability to take what people did, and how they did it, and forgive them and move on.”

— John Lewis

12. “We will stand up for what is right, for what is fair and what is just. Health care is a right and not a privilege.”

— John Lewis

13. “To make it hard, to make it difficult almost impossible for people to cast a vote is not in keeping with the democratic process.”

— John Lewis

14. “Races don’t fall in love, genders don’t fall in love: Individuals fall in love. We all should be free to marry the person that we love.”

— John Lewis

15. “My parents told me in the very beginning as a young child when I raised the question about segregation and racial discrimination, they told me not to get in the way, not to get in trouble, not to make any noise.”

— John Lewis

16. “I think all Americans should be hopeful, and try to be optimistic.”

— John Lewis

17. “When growing up, I saw segregation. I saw racial discrimination. I saw those signs that said white men, colored men. White women, colored women. White waiting. And I didn’t like it.”

— John Lewis

18. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” – NELSON MANDELA.”

— John Lewis

19. “My mother and father and many of my relatives had been sharecroppers.”

— John Lewis

20. “Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.”

— John Lewis

21. “Ornette Coleman is doing the only really new thing in jazz since the innovations in the mid-forties of Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and those of Thelonious Monk.”

— John Lewis

22. “I don’t have any extraordinary gifts. I’m just an average Joe who grew up very poor in rural Alabama.”

— John Lewis

23. “When we set our minds against one another, when we focus on destructive energy and propagate the negative notions of separation, division, discrimination, rejection, domination, and war, we waste our power in a futile attempt to debase, degrade, and even destroy the light in others.”

— John Lewis

24. “Ours is the struggle of a lifetime, or maybe even many lifetimes, and each one of us in every generation must do our part. And if we believe in the change we seek, then it is easy to commit to doing all we can, because the responsibility is ours alone to build a better society and a more peaceful world.”

— John Lewis

25. “Every generation leaves behind a legacy. What that legacy will be is determined by the people of that generation. What legacy do you want to leave behind?”

— John Lewis

26. “Political parties are on the hunt to search and destroy each other, as though we were involved in some kind of enemy combat, rather than the work of statesmanship.”

— John Lewis

27. “When I was a student, I studied philosophy and religion. I talked about being patient. Some people say I was too hopeful, too optimistic, but you have to be optimistic just in keeping with the philosophy of non-violence.”

— John Lewis

28. “The government, both state and federal, has a duty to be reasonable and accommodating.”

— John Lewis

29. “In the past the great majority of minority voters, in Ohio and other places that means African American voters, cast a large percentage of their votes during the early voting process.”

— John Lewis

30. “We must say: “Wake up America! Wake up!!” For we cannot stop, and we will not and cannot be patient.”

— John Lewis

31. “We are one people, one family, the human family, and what affects one of us affects us all.”

— John Lewis

32. “Love is the willingness to sacrifice.”

— John Lewis

33. “It is the responsibility, yet the individual choice, of each of us to use the light we have to dispel the work of darkness, because if we do not, then the power of falsehood rises.”

— John Lewis

34. “Fury spends itself pretty quickly when there’s no fury facing it.”

— John Lewis

35. “We came to bring our morality to politics, not to bring politics to our morality.”

— John Lewis

36. “Each and every one of us has the power to turn our enemies around because we are all a spark of the divine. It does not matter whether we are fit or weak, short and scrawny, or big and strong. There is no adversary who can defeat us if we believe in our own inner capacity to overcome. Sometimes we have to gain tools to overcome our adversaries. We might need to study, to get help, to pray, or develop a plan, but there is no obstacle we as human beings cannot overcome.”

— John Lewis

37. “It is only through examining history that you become aware of where you stand.”

— John Lewis

38. “Courage can feel uncomfortable. Courage is not about being popular, it’s about purpose.”

— John Lewis

39. “What can you do to get into good trouble? There is a light inside of you that will turn on when you get into good trouble. You will feel emboldened and freed. You will realize that unjust laws cannot stop you. These laws cannot stop the truth that is in your heart and soul.”

— John Lewis

40. “We have a “fast-food mentality” that expects an instant return on our investment of time, attention, and effort, a return that is concrete and clear. We are so comfortable charging forward and succeeding through our aggression and innovation that the idea of patience can seem contrary to our instincts.”

— John Lewis

41. “When you pray, move your feet. – AFRICAN PROVERB.”

— John Lewis

42. “Faith, to me, is knowing in the solid core of your soul that the work is already done, even as an idea is being conceived in your mind. It is being as sure as you are about your dreams as you are about anything you know as a hard fact.”

— John Lewis

43. “Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and help redeem the soul of America.”

— John Lewis

44. “When you see something that is not the way it should be, don’t be afraid. Speak up, speak out, be courageous.”

— John Lewis

45. “The power of faith is transformative. It can be utilized in your own personal life to change your individual condition, and it can be used as a lifeline of spiritual strength to change a nation.”

— John Lewis

46. “By the force of our demands, our determination and our numbers, we shall splinter the segregated South into a thousand pieces and put them back together in the image of God and democracy.”

— John Lewis

47. “When you burn down a building or topple a car, the violence drown out the injustice of what’s being done to you. It puts you on the same moral level as the people whose violence you are protesting. You’re no longer on the higher ground or plane. You make enemies of the people you need to win over to effect change.”

— John Lewis

48. “When you see something that is not the way it should be, don’t be afraid. Speak up, speak out, be courageous. It’s a total commitment. No compromise. Just go for it.”

— John Lewis

49. “We called it “making a way out of no way.” So when we were standing in protest facing police dogs and fire hoses, we knew without any doubt that somebody who was greater than us all would make a way out of no way and protect the defenders of the truth.”

— John Lewis

50. “But have faith that your good work will be a drop in the river that will eventually break the damn, ushering in a more peaceful world.”

— John Lewis