7 Quotes & Sayings By Ida B Wells

Ida Bell Wells-Barnett was born October 22, 1862. She was one of the most influential African American journalists of the nineteenth century. Ida was born into slavery in Mississippi County, Arkansas, the fourth of seven children. Her mother had died when Ida was five years old, and she was raised by her grandmother Read more

As a young child, Ida tended to spend much of her time outside, learning how to read and write. At age twelve she heard that her grandmother had been sold away from her family. The experience led Ida to question the institution of slavery.

She began reading about the subject and became determined to find some way to help liberate her people from oppression.

1
In fact, for all kinds of offenses - and, for no offenses - from murders to misdemeanors, men and women are put to death without judge or jury; so that, although the political excuse was no longer necessary, the wholesale murder of human beings went on just the same. Ida B. Wells
2
The mob spirit has grown with the increasing intelligence of the Afro-American. Ida B. Wells
3
No nation, savage or civilized, save only the United States of America, has confessed its inability to protect its women save by hanging, shooting, and burning alleged offenders. Ida B. Wells
4
The South is brutalized to a degree not realized by its own inhabitants, and the very foundation of government, law and order, are imperilled. Ida B. Wells
5
Brave men do not gather by thousands to torture and murder a single individual, so gagged and bound he cannot make even feeble resistance or defense. Ida B. Wells
6
The South resented giving the Afro-American his freedom, the ballot box and the Civil Rights Law. Ida B. Wells