THE GREATEST SPEECES IN THE WORLD

·         William Lyon Phelps - The Pleasure of Books (1933)

·         Pope John Paul II - At Israel's Holocaust Memorial (2000)

·         Pope Benedict XVI - "In This Place of Horror" (2006)

·         Ronald Reagan - Address to British Parliament (1982)

·         Ronald Reagan - On the 40th Anniversary of D-Day (1984)

·         Ronald Reagan - On the Challenger Disaster (1986)

·         Ronald Reagan - "Tear Down this Wall" (1987)

·         Maximilien Robespierre - Festival of the Supreme Being (1794)

·         Franklin D. Roosevelt - First Inaugural Address (1933)

·         Franklin D. Roosevelt - Third Inaugural Address (1941)

·         Franklin D. Roosevelt - For a Declaration of War (1941)

·         Franklin D. Roosevelt - D-Day Prayer (1944)

·         Gerhard Schröder - "I Express My Shame" (2005)

·         Elizabeth Cady Stanton - The Destructive Male (1868)

·         George Graham Vest - Tribute to Dogs (c1855)

·         George Washington - Prevents the Revolt of his Officers (1783)

·         Elie Wiesel - The Perils of Indifference (1999)

·         Woodrow Wilson - The Fourteen Points (1918)

I am the First Accused.

I hold a Bachelor's Degree in Arts and practised as an attorney in Johannesburg for a number of years in partnership with Oliver Tambo. I am a convicted prisoner serving five years for leaving the country without a permit and for inciting people to go on strike at the end of May 1961.

At the outset, I want to say that the suggestion made by the State in its opening that the struggle in South Africa is . . . . . . . .  . . . . . . . . . . .

.......................................................cont. reading on   the blog "I am prepared to die"

Steven Bantu Biko (18 December 1946 – 12 September 1977)

  "Black man, you are on your own."
Slogan coined by Steve Biko for the South African Student's Organisation, SASO.

"So as a prelude whites must be made to realise that they are only human, not superior. Same with Blacks. They must be made to realise that they are also human, not inferior."
As quoted in the Boston Globe, 25 October 1977.

"You are either alive and proud or you are dead, and when you are dead, you can't care anyway."
On Death, I Write What I Like, 1978

"The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed."
Speech in Cape Town, 1971

"The basic tenet of black consciousness is that the black man must reject all value systems that seek to make him a foreigner in the country of his birth and reduce his basic human dignity."
From Steve Biko's evidence given at the SASO/BPC trial, 3 May 1976.

"Being black is not a matter of pigmentation - being black is a reflection of a mental attitude."
The Definition of Black Consciousness, I Write What I Like, 1978.

"Merely by describing yourself as black you have started on a road towards emancipation, you have committed yourself to fight against all forces that seek to use your blackness as a stamp that marks you out as a subservient being."
The Definition of Black Consciousness, I Write What I Like, 1978.