Barbara Jordan

Fairness is an across-the-board requirement for all our interactions with each other ...Fairness treats everybody the same.
Barbara Jordan

A spirit of harmony can only survive if each of us remembers, when bitterness and self-interest seem to prevail, that we share a common destiny.
Barbara Jordan

One thing is clear to me: We, as human beings, must be willing to accept people who are different from ourselves.
Barbara Jordan

Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.
Barbara Jordan

The American dream is not dead. It is gasping for breath, but it is not dead.
Barbara Jordan

I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in ?We, the people?.
Barbara Jordan

We the people -- it is a very eloquent beginning. But when the Constitution of the United States was completed on the seventeenth of September in 1787, I was not included in that ?We the people?.
Barbara Jordan

My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total. I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.
Barbara Jordan

What the people want is very simple - they want an America as good as its promise.
Barbara Jordan

We want to be in control of our lives. Whether we are jungle fighters, craftsmen, company men, gamesmen, we want to be in control. And when the government erodes that control, we are not comfortable.
Barbara Jordan

I believe that women have a capacity for understanding and compassion which a man structurally does not have, does not have it because he cannot have it. He's just incapable of it.
Barbara Jordan

Just remember the world is not a playground but a schoolroom. Life is not a holiday but an education. One eternal lesson for us all: to teach us how better we should love.
Barbara Jordan

All my growth and development led me to believe that if you really do the right thing, and if you play by the rules, and if you?ve got good enough, solid judgment and common sense, that you?re going to be able to do whatever you want to do with your life.
Barbara Jordan

I never intended to become a run-of-the-mill person.
Barbara Jordan

I live a day at a time. Each day I look for a kernel of excitement. In the morning I say: "What is my exciting thing for today?" Then, I do the day. Don't ask me about tomorrow.
Barbara Jordan

I get from the soil and spirit of Texas the feeling that I, as an individual, can accomplish whatever I want to, and that there are no limits, that you can just keep going, just keep soaring. I like that spirit.
Barbara Jordan

If I have anything special that makes me "influential" I simply don't know how to define it. If I knew the ingredients I would bottle them, package them and sell them, because I want everyone to be able to work together in a spirit of cooperation and compromise and accommodation without, you know, any caving in or anyone being woefully violated personally or in terms of his principles.
Barbara Jordan

We must exchange the philosophy of excuse -- what I am is beyond my control -- for the philosophy of responsibility.
Barbara Jordan

Do not call for black power or green power. Call for brain power.
Barbara Jordan

This country can ill afford to continue to function using less than half of its human resources, brain power, and kinetic energy.
Barbara Jordan

If you're going to play the game properly, you'd better know every rule.
Barbara Jordan

There is no obstacle in the path of young people who are poor or members of minority groups that hard work and preparation cannot cure.
Barbara Jordan

Justice of right is always to take precedence over might.
Barbara Jordan, The Great Society: A Twenty Year Critique

The imperative is to define what is right and do it.
Barbara Jordan, The Great Society: A Twenty Year Critique

It is reason and not passion which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision.
Barbara Jordan, Testimony before the House Judiciary Committee

How do we create a harmonious society out of so many kinds of people? The key is tolerance -- the one value that is indispensable in creating community.
Barbara Jordan, All Together Now

The majority of the American people still believe that every single individual in this country is entitled to just as much respect, just as much dignity, as every other individual.
Barbara Jordan, The Johnson Years: LBJ: The Differences He Made

If the society today allows wrongs to go unchallenged, the impression is created that those wrongs have the approval of the majority.
Barbara Jordan, The Johnson Years: LBJ: The Differences He Made

We cannot improve on the system of government handed down to us by the founders of the Republic, but we can find new ways to implement that system and realize our destiny.
Barbara Jordan, Democratic National Convention