Quotes from John Hope Franklin

If the house is to be set in order, one cannot begin with the present; he must begin with the past.

If the house is to be set in the order, one cannot begin with the present; he must begin with the past

My challenge was to weave into the fabric of American history enough of the presence of blacks so that the story of the United States could be told adequately and fairly.

The writing of history reflects the interests, predilections, and even prejudices of a given generation.

We also learn that this country and the Western world have no monopoly of goodness and truth and scholarship, we begin to appreciate the ingredients that are indispensable to making a better world. In a life of learning that is, perhaps, the greatest lesson of all.

We must go beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths and untrodden depths of the wilderness and travel and explore and tell the world the glories of our journey.

I am very fortunate, and I never stopped being thankful.

We also learn that this country and the Western world have no monopoly of goodness and truth and scholarship, we begin to appreciate the ingredients that are indispensable to making a better world. In a life of learning that is, perhaps, the greatest lesson of all.

We must get beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths... and tell the world the glories of our journey.

We must go beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths and untrodden depths of the wilderness and travel and explore and tell the world the glories of our journey;

We've got to tell the unvarnished truth

Buck learned this the hard way. In 1911, when a client's case pending in Shreveport, Louisiana, was called, Buck stood as a signal to the judge that he was present and ready to proceed. In disbelief, the presiding judge asked my father why he was standing. When Buck made the simple reply that he was representing his client in the case, the judge retorted that no "nigger" represented anyone in his court. With that pronouncement, my father was ordered to vacate the courtroom.

The South's] obsession was to maintain a government, an economy, an arrangement of the sexes, a relationship of the races, and a social system that had never existed...except in the fertile imagination of those who would not confront either the reality that existed or the change that would bring them closer to reality.

Love each other. Regard each other as members of one family.

It was necessary, as a black historian, to have a personal agenda.