We've talked more about civil rights after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 than we talked about it before 1964.
Even as someone who's labeled a conservative - I'm a Republican I'm black, I'm heading up this organization in the Reagan administration - I can say that conservatives don't exactly break their necks to tell blacks that they're welcome.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Clarence Thomas expresses the sentiment that the conservative political movement often does not reach out to welcome Black individuals.
In this quote, Clarence Thomas, a prominent African American figure within the conservative Republican Party, highlights the disconnect between the conservative movement and the Black community. He notes that despite his own position within the Reagan administration, there is a lack of proactive efforts from conservatives to make Black individuals feel included and valued within their political ideology, pointing to a broader issue of representation and outreach within the party.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a political debate to illustrate the need for better engagement with minority communities.
More from Clarence Thomas
All quotes →Good manners will open doors that the best education cannot.
I was Catholic. You talk about a minority within a minority within a minority: a black Catholic in Savannah, GA.
When I was a kid, we said that we were precluded from going to certain neighborhoods because of the color of our skin Now the neighborhoods are the neighborhoods of ideas, youre not supposed to be there because of the color of your skin.
The myths that are created about the South, about the way we grew up, about black people, are wrong.
Similar quotes
I intend to talk about race during this election in the South because the Republicans have been talking about it since 1968 in order to divide us. And I'm going to bring us together. Because you know what? You know what? White folks in the South who drive pickup trucks with Confederate flag decals in the back ought to be voting with us and not them, because their kids don't have health insurance either and their kids need better schools too.
The secret ballot makes a secret government; and a secret government is a secret band of robbers and murderers.
We need to mobilise our structures and our supporters to oppose state capture and corruption in whatever form it takes.
For what were all these country patriots born? To hunt, and vote, and raise the price of corn?
That no government, so called, can reasonably be trusted, or reasonably be supposed to have honest purposes in view, any longer than it depends wholly upon voluntary support.
My first reaction to Trump being elected was a visceral one. I cried for black people in general but, more particularly, for those of us at the margins who have been struggling and who have never received enough support.