Mississippi Quotes

“[I]n our Mississippi, ALL are Welcome.”

“Mississippi to Philly, Albuquerque to Chat-town!”

“Mississippi is such a diverse and multifaceted place.”

“Kill her in Mississippi and drive her ass to Missouri.”

“Pray to the to the Lord for these Mississippi streets.”

“Wikipedia: Mississippi”

“Alabama's gotten me so upset/Tennessee made me lose my rest/And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam”

“Mississippi's history deserves study and reflection, no matter how unpleasant or complicated parts of it may be.”

“Bring the gangster walk back. Memphis! Mississippi! Everybody from the south, let's ride... North Mississippi in this bastard!”

“I love the spring in Mississippi... I'm so incredibly proud to say I'm say I'm from Mississippi, and Mississippians continue to make me proud to say that's where I'm from.”

“If the voters of Mississippi were capable of shame, they would replace legislators loyal to the laws of South Africa by legislators loyal to the laws of the United States.”

“Government secrecy outside the strict confines of national security is a generally bad thing, and it never appears to work out well for those being governed. Mississippi in particular should know this well.”

“(Any favorite Mississippi or Louisiana authors you’d like to recommend?) There are so many: Ernest Gaines, Natasha Trethewey, Donna Tartt, Richard Wright, Margaret Walker and Robert Olen Butler are just a few I love.”

“I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over the years, either.”

“I once asked a New York reporter if his newsroom issued him a pith helmet and jodhpurs when he ventured down to the Heart of Darkness they portray Mississippi to be. He had asked me if I knew where he could find some Klan to interview and didn't appear to believe me when I told him it wasn't much of a going concern in most of the state anymore.”

“Recently I went along with a field secretary of the N.A.A.C.P. in Mississippi to investigate a murder that had been hushed up. We rode around through those back roads for hours talking to people who had known the dead man, trying to find out what had happened. And the Negroes talked to us as the German Jews must have talked when Hitler came to power. (1969)”

“Know what I'm talking about. Yeah, Mississippi. Motherfucker! Newton County. What I live and die for, Scott County. Ball for the kids, Simpson County. Know what I'm talking about. Hell yeah! Mississippi, you know what I'm talking about. The home of the blues, the dirtiest part of the south. You know what I'm talking about. The place where you get them fish and them criss, motherfucker. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. The Delta, motherfucker. Cotton, you know what I'm talking bout!”

“All I can say is that I am well. I have the enemy closely hemmed in all round. My position is naturally strong and fortified against an attack from outside. I have been so strongly reinforced that Johnston will have to come with a mighty host to drive me away. I do not look upon the fall of Vicksburg as in the least doubtful. If, however, I could have carried the place on the 22nd of last month, I could by this time have made a campaign that would have made the State of Mississippi almost safe for a solitary horseman to ride over.”

“If now you young people, instead of running away from the battle here in Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi, instead of seeking freedom and opportunity in Chicago and New York—which do spell opportunity—nevertheless grit your teeth and make up your minds to fight it out right here if it takes every day of your lives and the lives of your children’s children; if you do this, you must in meetings like this ask yourselves what does the fight mean? How can it be carried on? What are the best tools, arms, and methods? And where does it lead? I should be the last to insist that the uplift of mankind never calls for force and death. There are times, as both you and I know, when "Tho’ love repine and reason chafe, There came a voice without reply, ‘Tis man’s perdition to be safe, When for truth he ought to die."”

“My statue at Ole Miss is a false idol. And it wasn't put there for my benefit. It was put there for Ole Miss and Mississippi...Ole Miss kicked my butt and they're still celebrating. Because every black that's gone there since me has been insulted, humiliated, and they can't even tell their story. Everybody has to tell James Meredith's story — which is a lie. The powers that be in Mississippi understand this very clearly. See, I've been telling them for fifty years how insulting it is to me to suggest that I had to be courageous to confront some ignorant white folks. And recently, they told me they really understand, but they're gonna keep doing it. I can't figure a way to make 'em stop. They're gonna keep on doin' it because it makes it impossible for the blacks there now to say anything about what's happened to them. Because the comparison is with the idol.”