Minority group

“ I confess, Sir, I have not known, in peaceable times, the power of the majority carried with a higher hand, or upheld with more relentless disregard of the rights, feelings and principles of the minority;—a minority embracing, as the gentleman himself will admit, a large portion of the worth and respectability of the State;—a minority comprehending in its numbers men who have been associated with him, and with us, in these halls of legislation; men who have served their country at home and honored it abroad ”

“ The pangs of the minorities are doubtless excruciating; but we welcome an eternal minority, under the banner inscribed with our principles, rather than an almighty and everlasting majority, purchased by their abandonment. ”

“ A strong tendency to the formation of social groups of various kinds, political, cultural, religious, recreational, should be hailed as a sign of life in the community. And even if the association be formed for the promulgation of the view of a dissenting minority, it should be as frankly encouraged as any other. For no view ever gains a considerable following which does not embody some fact or truth of experience which is necessary to the wholeness of life. ”

“ We are, it is true, the appointed of a minority, and with that fact our enemies already taunt us, but, I would ask you, has it not always been minorities who have achieved anything worth achieving? who have brought about any unmistakably radical political or economic changes? ”

“ Multitudes have embraced that truth in whole or part; vastly more, however, in part than as a saving whole. According to their apprehensions of it, they have resolved themselves into party groups. A minority -- a great minority, so great as to be styled "a few", have seized upon it in letter and spirit. ”

“ 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. ”

“ But in all cases where the strength of the minority is half, or nearly half as great as that of the majority, the desired representation of the minority may be insured with sufficient certainty by several different plans. ”

“ According to fact and experience, a minority may, in an appeal to force, be an overmatch for the majority;—in the first place, if the minority happen to include all such as possess the skill and habits of military life, with such as possess the great pecuniary resources, one third may conquer the remaining two thirds ”

“ If, indeed, every man in the community possessed an equal share of what Mr Mill calls the objects of desire, the majority would probably abstain from plundering the minority. A large minority would offer a vigorous resistance; and the property of a small minority would not repay the other members of the community for the trouble of dividing it. But it happens that in all civilised communities there is a small minority of rich men, and a great majority of poor men. ”

“ The minority, sir, are contending for the rights of mankind; what, then, are the majority contending for? If the minority are contending for the rights of mankind, the majority must be contending for the doctrines of tyranny and slavery. ”

“ It would seem the part of social wisdom, therefore, in this, as in all other matters of social control, to ask ourselves the question, What rule on the whole gives the best condition for the largest number of persons?—and on the answer to that question base our law and custom, then add considerate treatment for the minority who must in the nature of things have some handicap if the rule is obeyed by the majority. ”

“ Society itself will be broken into so many parts, interests, and classes of citizens, that the rights of individuals, or of the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority. ”

“ One may hazard the statement that the prejudice of America’s native white majority against the Negroes, the Indians, the Jews and the Asiatics, is now and has always been in some sense attributable and proportional to the majority’s fear of some action on the part of the minority which might injure the material interests of the majority, while the only race-differences which have had any real importance are those superficial ones which serve to make the members of the minorities recognizable at sight. ”

“ The majority of people, wherever found, ought in all questions to govern the minority. If the interior country should acquire this majority, it will not only have the right, but will avail itself of it, whether we will or no. ”

“ Upon this fact rests the basis of my wonderful improvements. If the majority be wrong, the inference is obvious—the minority must be right. Then, in future, let everything be conducted by the minority—the sensible few. ”

“ Yet it is a plain fact that the entire world of humanity is more or less segregated in groups. The family group gave rise to the tribal group, the tribal group to the regional group, and the regional group to the national group. There are groups within groups: language groups, labor groups, racial groups and class groups. Certainly no sane group desires public segregation and discrimination. But it is a clear historical fact that different groups have won their social rights only when they developed a group spirit and strong group organization. ”

“ And the bigger the majority which is thus extracting sustenance from the minority, and exploiting it to its own ends, the more you will admire the minority if it rises in revolt, and makes the imposed and one-sided bargain unprofitable to the majority. ”

“ The white man's so-called privilege of class is made little of and the rules of government are framed with greater care for the interests of the majority who are not European than for those of the minority of superior race. ”

“ A somewhat extensive reading of history has failed to show an instance in which a country occupied by two distinct races, with the minority race in control by reason of its possession of the property and educational opportunities, a government fair to the majority has ever resulted. ”

“ The restless minority.—Its elements.—The clubs.—Their ascendancy.—How they interpret the Rights of Man.—Their usurpations and violence.
In default of the majority, who shirk their responsibilities, it is the minority which does the work and assumes the power. The majority having resigned, the minority becomes sovereign, and public business, abandoned by the hesitating, weak, and absent multitude, falls into the hands of the resolute, energetic, ever-present few who find the leisure and the disposition to assume the responsibility. ”

“ It is a superstition and an ungodly thing to believe that an act of a majority binds a minority. Many examples can be given in which acts of majorities will be found to have been wrong, and those of minorities to have been right. All reforms owe their origin to the initiation of minorities in opposition to majorities. ”

“ When, on the contrary, majority rule exists, two modes of subordination of the minority are possible, and discrimination between them is of the highest sociological significance. Control of the minority may, in the first place, arise from the fact that the many are more powerful than the few. Although, or rather because the individuals participating in a vote are supposed to be equals, the majority have the physical power to coerce the minority. ”

“ If they refuse, the question is debated a third time, when, if the minority has not perceptibly grown, they always give way; though I believe there is some half-forgotten rule by which they might still carry it on further; but I say, what always happens is that they are convinced, not perhaps that their view is the wrong one, but they cannot persuade or force the community to adopt it. ”

“ The Constitution favors no racial group no political or social group. ”

“ It put before a keen-eyed and unscrupulous minority—a minority proud, aggressive, turbulent, arrogant, and scornful of all things save their own will and pleasure—the temptation to enhance their power by seizing that held by the trembling hands of simple-minded and unskilled guardians. ”

“ In the light of this principle, and bearing in mind the extreme desirability of having the minority elements participate and share responsibility in the conduct of Bahá’í activity, it should be the duty of every Bahá’í community so to arrange its affairs that in cases where individuals belonging to the divers minority elements within it are already qualified and fulfill the necessary requirements, Bahá’í representative institutions, be they Assemblies, conventions, conferences, or committees, may have represented on them as many of these divers elements, racial or otherwise, as possible. ”

“ I remember that excellent little high school text book, "Nordhoff's Politics," where I first read of government, saying this sentence at the beginning of its most important chapter: "The first duty of a minority is to become a majority." This is a statement which has its underlying truth, but it also has its dangerous falsehood; viz., any minority which cannot become a majority is not worthy of any consideration. But suppose that the out-voted minority is necessarily always a minority? ”

“ A majority must of necessity be inferior to a picked minority and it always resents specializations in which it cannot share. 6In the French Revolution the majority, calling itself “the people,” deliberately endeavored to destroy the higher type and something of the same sort was in a measure done after the American Revolution by the expulsion of the Loyalists and the confiscation of their lands, with a resultant loss to the growing nation of good race strains, which were in the next century replaced by immigrants of far lower type. ”

“ So a small minority rules and governs the majority. This may for those in the saddle be clever enough, but can never be right in theory. What ab initio could give an absolute unlimitted right to one twentieth of a community, to govern the other nineteen by their sovereign will and pleasure? ”

“ There are three to-day: to-morrow there will be five, the next day ten, twenty, a hundred, till every man’s hand is against his fellow, and his fellow’s against him. The divisions have grown so wide that the majority and the minority are but the extremities of a countless set of internecine majorities and minorities. ”

“ Nor in a free government can we afford to employ journeymen; they may be apprenticed until they learn to read, and study our institutions; and then let them become joint proprietors and feel a proportionate responsibility. The two learned and distinguished authors of the minority report have been studying the science of ethnology and have treated us with a dissertation on the races. ”

“ And such proceedings can happen, and will happen, in any community where a class of ignorant toilers are placed by custom and race-prejudice beyond the pale of sympathy and race-brotherhood. So long as the best elements of a community do not feel in duty bound to protect and train and care for the weaker members of their group, they leave them to be preyed upon by these swindlers and rascals. ”

“ Considering that a pluralist and genuinely democratic society should not only respect the ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity of each person belonging to a national minority, but also create appropriate conditions enabling them to express, preserve and develop this identity ”

“ In America the dissenting minority displays remarkable discipline, and if the majority has formally taken action, one hears no grumbling or quibbling from the discontented, whether among boys at play or men who have everything at stake. The outvoiced minority is self-controlled and good-natured and ready at once to take part in the work which the majority has laid out; and herein lies one of the clearest results of the American system and one of the superior traits of American character. ”

“ Then, a minority within the lefts may be so powerful through its persistency, or, again, through its fanatical obsession on a particular point, that it is able to force a majority within the party to act in the particular way the minority wants. In short, there are a dozen different ways, under a Representative System, of making operative, not the Will of the Majority of the People, but the Will of a Minority. ”

“ In the eyes of Professor Commons, such a system makes it the merest chance if the best man is elected, and subverts our whole system of representative government. [339] It seems beyond question that the existence of separate racial groups in a community, each with its own prejudices and group loyalty, must have a very disturbing influence on the course of elections. ”

“ It here means the exceptionally gifted and efficient minority, no matter what the position in which its members may have been born, or what the sphere of social progress in which their exceptional efficiency shows itself. ”

“ The American state is dedicated to such a duty, not only by its democratic purpose, but by its national tradition. So far as the former is concerned, it is absurd and fatal to ask a popular majority to respect the rights of a minority, when those rights are interpreted so as seriously to hamper, if not to forbid, the majority from obtaining the essential condition of individual freedom and development—viz. ”

“ Finally, it has been argued that ethnic preferences "compensate" the group by providing examples of success whom other members of the group will emulate, thereby advancing the group's interest and society's interest in encouraging new generations to overcome the barriers and frustrations of the past. ”

“ A leading advocate of permanent peace recently suggested that the question of national minorities might be solved to a large degree by a system of judicious exchange of such minorities, or of various members thereof. ”

“ In other words, I think the yardstick to determine right from wrong for each of the communities into which the race is divided is to be found in its consciousness. If this view is sound, the time will come when the standard of justice will be found in the consciousness of the race; for the time is coming when all the different communities will be fused into one community, and when that time comes, community ideals will be the ideals of the human race. ”