The future of Haiti must be linked to the respect of the rights of every single citizen.
A commitment to human rights cannot be fostered simply through the transmission of knowledge. Action and experience play a crucial role in the learning process.
While men's rights are guaranteed by specific language in the Constitution, women's equal rights aren't mentioned.
Without the U.S. leading the way in trade negotiations, we likely will see irreversible damage to our environment and widespread abuse of labor and human rights, all while we lose out on the opportunity to expand our economy and create jobs.
I wanted to represent minorities in the respect of people who had been bullied in school or people who were gay or lesbian or trans or people who aren't blonde haired and blue-eyed. I have short hair, and I am covered in tattoos. I like showing people that it's within their rights to be different.
If you look at attitudes today and where they are headed, it's clear to me that supporting equal rights, including the rights to civil marriage, is a net positive for winning elections, as well as the right thing to do.
As soon as I finish a book, I sell the paperback rights to different publishers and that's where I recoup my money.
Most people who are selling their mineral rights, this is a once-in-a-lifetime transaction. The people who are buying, the landmen who are coming in, do it every day. So there's a little inequity there about knowledge.
We know no document is perfect, but when we amend the Constitution, it would be to expand rights, not to take away rights from decent, loyal Americans. This great Constitution of ours should never be used to make a group of Americans permanent second-class citizens.
It makes no sense that this country has 11 million workers feeding, building this country, making America what it is, and they don't share the same rights of those who are consuming the fruit of their labor.
Women, men, and children have fundamental rights to humanitarian assistance and protection. Yet far too many states block aid and attack their own citizens, and too many others - including some of the world's wealthiest countries - turn their back on those fleeing conflict and violence.
True freedom requires the rule of law and justice, and a judicial system in which the rights of some are not secured by the denial of rights to others.
In the EU you have half a billion people who share a common belief in democracy, in rights, in the kind of economic life we want.
I endeavour to read more, be more informed on gay rights. Whatever floats your boat is my outlook. It's hard enough to be happy without having legislation against you, too.
Civil rights happened because youth got involved. The youth stood up and helped to break the pattern that their parents had got accustomed to living. The next generation has to take that stand for whatever it is, socially, that they are involved in.
I'm an animal rights activist because I believe we won't have a planet if we continue to behave toward other species the way we do.
Corporations that are formed for the purpose of earning profits do not have the constitutionally protected rights that natural citizens have. They should not spend their corporate dollars, Treasury dollars, to influence outcome of elections.
Who needs the protection of the Bill of Rights most? The weak, the most vulnerable in society.
There is a huge reservoir of support for abortion rights from ordinary women. I hear all the time from women who had abortions and say it made possible the good life they went on to have. Social shaming silences too many.
We do believe that freedom, the right to choose, the right to vote, respect and justice is the fundamental right of all people. All people must obtain these rights.
I'd say that animal rights and environmental issues have always been at the forefront of my mind.
We must make our world safer by rooting out the evil in our midst while still protecting the rights of people who mean no harm.
As I got more into gay rights, I got more into equal pay, and you just see that it's all connected. You can't really speak out on one thing and not another without it not being the full picture.
On the human rights side, administration policy has been marked by indifference. When the people of Iran flooded the streets to protest the theft of their presidential election in June 2009, President Obama was silent for 11 days.
Some might consider me an unlikely advocate for gun rights because I sustained terrible injuries in a violent shooting. But I'm a patriot, and I believe the right to bear arms is a definitive part of our American heritage.
The Republican Party supported the Equal Rights Amendment before the Democratic Party did. But what happened was that a lot of very right-wing Democrats, after the civil rights bill of 1964, left the Democratic Party and gradually have taken over the Republican Party.
The very idea of law originates in men's natural rights. There is no other standard, than natural rights, by which civil law can be measured. Law has always been the name of that rule or principle of justice, which protects those rights. Thus we speak of natural law.
We must continue to prove to the world that we can provide a rising standard of living for all men without loss of civil rights or human dignity to any man.
No one who passively endures an injustice against himself has the material in him to struggle for the rights of others. The one who patiently forbears becomes an accessory to the injustice done to others. He who resists the injustice which he himself meets can open up the way to a higher right for others.
In the past 30 years, officials of the Iranian regime and its apologists have labeled criticism, especially with regard to women's rights, as anti-Islamic and pro-Western, justifying its brutalities by ascribing them to Islam and Iran's culture.
I began to think, now is the time. I found quite a lot of opposition in Hollywood about the idea of doing a film musical and we ended up having to buy the rights back. I'm glad we did because it meant John and I were able to make exactly the movie we wanted.
This country was founded on a promise of equal rights for all, and we have always managed to move closer to that promise, little by little, one day at a time. It may not be easy - but we'll get there together.
I liked the name of the amendment. I couldn't help feeling uneasy that the church was opposing something with a name as beautiful as the Equal Rights Amendment.
The Obama years will be remembered as a cultural - and legal - tipping point for equality for all people who do not identify as strictly heterosexual, arguably the civil rights movement of our times. The president signed the bill repealing 'don't ask, don't tell.' The Defense of Marriage Act was struck down by the Supreme Court.
I try to live tolerance in my own way, which is why, as a politician, one of my key priorities is to stand up for human rights.
Today there are people trying to take away rights that our mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers fought for: our right to vote, our right to choose, affordable quality education, equal pay, access to health care. We the people can't let that happen.