“Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, ‘Wait.’ But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim…when you see the vast majority of twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky…when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you…when…your wife and mother are never given the respected title ‘Mrs.’…when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of ‘nobodiness’—then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair.”


種族隔離政策就像一只尖銳的飛鏢，對未曾蒙受其害的人來說，「等待」或許容易的多。當你目睹暴徒凶惡至極，以私刑絞死你的父母，淹死你的兄弟姐妹⋯⋯當你知道在看似富裕的社會中，卻有二千萬多名黑人同胞   只能活在令人至息的貧窮中。當電視上介紹著兒童樂園，而你六歲大的女兒疑惑著為何自己不能去，你卻只能結結巴巴說不出真正原因⋯⋯當她知道歡樂小鎮不允許有色人種孩童入園遊玩，她小小的雙眼滿是淚水，你只能眼睜睜看著自卑的情緒漸漸籠罩著她的心⋯⋯當你開車長途旅行，卻只能窩在車上的一角，勉強過夜，只因為沒有一家旅館願意讓你入住⋯⋯ 當你的妻子與母親因為種族歧視，永遠也得不到一句「女士」的尊稱。而你窮盡一生都在努力避免喪失自尊、否定自我，經歷過這一切後，或許就能懂得我們己無法再等待下去。該是時候停止忍耐這一切的不公，沒有人該永遠活在無望的深淵之中。