Equal rights

“ This Society calls itself the Equal Rights Association. That I understand to be an association which has no distinction of sex, class, or color. Congress does not seem to understand the meaning of the term universal. ”

“ Liberty—Fraternity—Equality!
All who stand beneath our banner are free. Ours is the only flag that has in reality written upon it: Liberty, Fraternity, Equality—the three grandest words in all the languages of men. Liberty: Give to every man the fruit of his own labor—the labor of his hand and of his brain. Fraternity: Every man in the right is my brother. Equality: The rights of all are equal. No race, no color, no previous condition, can change the rights of men. ”

“ In saying this, I beg not to be understood as denying 'the Declaration of Independence.' I understand the illustrious writer of that instrument to mean no more than this; that for good reasons, operating in the social state, all men are to be regarded as equal, so far as to have equal respect paid to their rights; to be entitled to equal protection, and to be judged by one standard of legal rectitude. Or, in other words, in the eye of the law, all men are equal. ”

“ In just association with this humanity will be the triumph of Equal Rights, when the promises of the great Declaration are all fulfilled, and our people are united, as never before, in the enduring fellowship of a common citizenship. ”

“ Would he be admitted to an equal share in your political rights?—would he ever be allowed to cross the threshold of your doors?—would any of you give your daughter to his son, or your son to his daughter?—would you, in any one particular, admit him to the footing of equality which any man with a white skin would claim, whose ability and worth had so raised him from the lower degrees of the social scale. ”

“ If the state favors one more than another it does deny that other equal protection. I do not subscribe to the doctrine that "the greatest good of the greatest number" is to be sought. The only legitimate search is for the good of the whole number without discrimination for or against any one. This sentiment found expression in the once popular slogan, "Equal rights for all. Special privileges for none." I say once popular, for today it would seem not popular in practice. ”

“ Accordingly, all the leading reformers begin by piously reiterating certain phrases about equal rights for all and special privileges for none, and of government of the people, by the people, and for the people. ”

“ DEMOCRACY AND DISCRIMINATION The principle of equal rights has always appealed to its more patriotic and sensible adherents as essentially an impartial rule of political action—one that held a perfectly fair balance between the individual and society, and between different and hostile individual and class interests. ”

“ All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that, though the will of the majority is, in all cases, to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and to violate which would be oppression. ”

“ We demand freedom to establish our affairs in our way, and accord you that right. Take the hand of restraint from us. Give us our natural right to manage our own affairs, and we will respect your equal rights. ”

“ When the state finds itself in a similar position, it does the same thing.
The considerations which answer the argument of equal rights also answer the objections to treating man as a thing, and the like. ”

“ Resolved, That we demand a full recognition of our equal rights, civil and political—no special legislation can satisfy us—the enjoyment of a right to-day is no security that it will be continued to-morrow, so long as it is granted to us by a privileged class, and not secured to us as a sacred right. ”

“ We will transmit to them liberty and equal rights, secured by laws respectable and respected; we will transmit to them a social organization in which every human being can enjoy the fruits of his labor with dignity and independence; we will transmit to them a full abundance of the means which promote the untramelled development of the moral and ideal element in human nature. ”

“ Whether this principle shall live or die has been one of the great problems with which modern society has been engaged through the intervening periods. As a question between equal rights and unequal rights, between equal laws and unequal laws, between the rights of wealth, of rank and of official position, and the power of justice and intelligence, there can be little doubt of the ultimate result. ”

“ Foremost is the Equality of All Men. Of course, in a declaration of rights, no such supreme folly was intended as that all men are created equal in form or capacity, bodily or mental,—but simply that they are created equal in rights. ”

“ The power to legislate implies the power to discriminate; and the best way consequently for a good democracy of equal rights to avoid the danger of discrimination will be to organize the state so that its power for ill will be rigidly restricted. ”

“ By means of equitable laws we enabled all the people to share with us our rights, and all the blessings of our country and constitution. We called them to be our brothers, one with us in the enjoyment of personal, religious, social and political freedom; to be as entirely equal with us in these respects as we all are equal, whether king or beggar, rich or poor, in the certainty of death and in the common hope of a life beyond the grave. ”

“ We make the statement that the Government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed, and that all human beings have equal rights. This is not an ism—it is simply an assertion that we shall be true to the highest truth. ”

“ At that time only a few dreamed about equal rights for all, discussed the pride of position and birth, complained about the unjust privileges, and compared the fate of the oppressed with the fate of those occupying higher places in life. ”

“ So there is constant surrendering of personal desires in recognition of the fact that others have equal rights, and that, after all, one part is as good as another, since all are essential to the whole. ”

“ The self-evident truth that all men are equal, that they have equal rights to enjoy and possess property, and to the protection of those rights in the courts, and that all should bear their proportionate share of the public burdens, MUST be recognized, by all classes, as the supreme law of this republic. ”

“ There is necessarily implied in the statement that "all men are created equal" and that "they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," the conception of the right of human equality as a divine right. But is there any other basis than divine right on which to rest a doctrine of human equality? A doctrine of human equality by human right, is a doctrine of equality by consent. ”

“ Soon, they began to insist that inasmuch as Colour, which was a second Nature, had destroyed the need of aristocratic distinctions, the Law should follow in the same path, and that henceforth all individuals and all classes should be recognized as absolutely equal and entitled to equal rights. ”

“ Equal rights before the law, protection to life and property, the right to exist, the right to vote, the right to earn a living, the right to be a man, the right to be a freedman and a freeman, the right to expect equal and exact justice irrespective of creed, color or condition, is a greater privilege than being an officeholder. ”

“ When the government, therefore, has secured to each of its citizens equal rights before the law and equal opportunities for improvement and progress, it has accomplished the end for which it was organized, and performed all of the functions respecting social advantages with which it is endowed. ”

“ The nation is interested in what you do. If you win your diploma, your enemies lose and your friends gain one very important point in the great argument for equal rights. When you shall have demonstrated that you have equal powers, then equal rights will come in due time. ”

“ Let her ask to be placed on an equality with man in regard to the holding of property, or to civil or ecclesiastical rights, or authority or position; let the daughters ask equal rights and privileges with sons; let them request admission into the same colleges and universities with their brothers, so that they may compete with them for the honors and degrees conferred in such institutions,—and what then? The flowery oratory is all gone. The "angels," the "heroic, brave, and virtuous women," have suddenly become agitators whose conduct is unseemly. ”

“ That these rights are equal is so familiar and stale an expression that it hardly need be spoken. "All men are created equal," each having rights, that are inalienable, and each having the right to resist the encroachment on his rights by another. ”

“ Let us put the canon of equality in a different shape, namely, that there should always be a sufficient reason for any difference in the treatment of our fellows. This rule does not imply that I should act in all cases as though all men were equal in character or mind, but that my action should in all cases be justified by some appropriate consideration. ”

“ In every commercial state, notwithstanding any pretension to equal rights, the exaltation of a few must depress the many. ”

“ This principle contains the program of our political existence. It is the most progressive, for it takes even the lowliest members of the human family out of their degradation, and inspires them with the elevating consciousness of equal human dignity; the most conservative, for it makes a common cause of individual rights. From the equality of rights springs identity of our highest interests; you cannot subvert your neighbors' rights without striking a dangerous blow at your own. ”

“ So I dropped the subject, for when it comes to the American Ideal, I am hopelessly at variance, and think it better to say no more. The Ideal is this, you see, that every people in the world should have self-government and equal rights. ”

“ If you want to be free, there is but one way: it is to guarantee an equally full measure of liberty to all your neighbors. There is no other.
True, there are difficulties connected with an organization of society founded upon the basis of equal rights. ”

“ But surely it cannot be said that this common right confers on brutes, men, and angels, essential equality of rights in any practical sense whatever; for then it will follow that brutes, men, and angels have an equal right to social and political equality—a bold and reckless absurdity. ”

“ Instead of universal equal rights, the actual enjoyment of which is necessarily contingent on, and commensurate with, power, the rights of the people were made dependent on a variety of conditions, the first of which was the distribution of property. ”

“ At all events, the opposition to the attempt at widening woman's sphere, or spheres, has ceased, and the recognition of the principles of equal rights, no matter for what color or sex, or previous servitude, is all but universal. ”

“ Wherefore, since the law is the bond of civil society, and the justice of the law equal, by what rule can the association of citizens be held together, if the condition of the citizens be not equal? For if the fortunes of men cannot be reduced to this equality if genius cannot be equally the property of all—rights, at least, should be equal among those who are citizens of the same republic. ”

“ The law of nature, the law of justice, would say—and it is so expounded by the publicists—that equal rights in the common property shall be enjoyed. Even in a monarchy the king can not prevent the subjects from enjoying equality in the disposition of the public property. Even in a despotic government this principle is recognized. ”

“ Nearly allied to impartiality is the idea of equality. The justice of giving equal protection to the rights of all is maintained even when the rights themselves are very unequal, as in slavery and in the system of ranks or castes. There are the greatest differences as to what is equality in the distribution of the produce of labour ”

“ Every person regardless of sex, race, nationality, language, religion, social origin, convictions, personal and social status shall have equal rights and liberties and shall be equal before law.
Benefits and privileges may be granted only by law and should comply with the principles of social justice. ”

“ Equal rights to the best facilites for intellectual and spiritual culture, equal rights in the eligibility to every position of honor and trust, and equal rights in the exercise of a free and unconstrained choice in all social relations, is a principle at once American, Methodistic, and Scriptural. ”

“ Both men and women enjoyed equal rights. Every man and woman in the country was a public servant; they all worked for the public good. Each law adopted was put into force through the direct vote of all the people. ”