Amistad (1997) - Quotes

Taglines: A true story.

Taglines: Freedom is not given. It is our right at birth. But there are some moments when it must be taken.

Ens. Covey: [translating for Cinque after he has been set free] What did you say to them?

John Quincy Adams: Huh?

Ens. Covey: [translates again] What words did you use to persuade them?

John Quincy Adams: [looks at Cinque] Yours.

John Quincy Adams: Now, you understand you're going to the Supreme Court. Do you know why?

Ens. Covey: [translating for Cinque] It is the place where they finally kill us.

Calderon: What's most bewildering to Her Majesty...is this arrogant independence of the American courts. After all, if you cannot rule the courts, you cannot rule.

Martin Van Buren: Señor Calderon, as any true American will tell you, it's the independence of our courts that keeps us free.

Cinque: You don't have to pretend to be interested in that. Nobody's watching but me.

Yamba: [turns the page, showing an image of the newborn Jesus] I'm not pretending. I'm beginning to understand it. Their people have suffered more than ours...Their lives were full of suffering. Then he was born and everything changed.

Cinque: Who is he?

Yamba: [turns the page, showing Jesus healing the sick; another page, Jesus protecting Mary Magdelene; another page, Jesus with children] I don't know, but everywhere he goes he is followed by the sun. Here he is healing people with his hands. Protecting them... Being given children...

Cinque: [sees a picture of Jesus walking on water] What's this?

Yamba: [as he speaks, Judge Coglin kneels before a communion rail, praying; turns the page, showing Jesus before Pilate] He could also walk across the sea. But then something happened...He was captured, accused of some sort of crime. Here he is with his hands tied.

Cinque: He must have done something.

Yamba: Why? What did we do? Whatever it was, it was serious enough to kill him for it. Do you want to see how they killed him?

Cinque: This is just a story, Yamba.

Yamba: [shows the disciples taking Jesus' body down from the cross; draws a cross in the air; shows the Resurrection; turns to an image of Jesus ascending to Heaven, then to another to Heaven's light breaking through the clouds] But look. That's not the end of it. His people took his body down from this...thing...this... They took him into a cave. They wrapped him in a cloth, like we do. They thought he was dead, but he appeared before his people again...and spoke to them. Then, finally, he rose into the sky. This is where the soul goes when you die here. This is where we're going when they kill us. It doesn't look so bad.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: Cinque describes the cold-blooded murder of a significant portion of the people on board the Tecora. Mr Holabird sees this as a paradox. Do you, sir?

Captain Fitzgerald: Often when slavers are intercepted, or believe they may be, they simply throw all their prisoners over board and thereby rid themselves of the evidence of their crime.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: Drown hundreds of people?

Captain Fitzgerald: Yes.

William S. Holabird: It hardly seems a lucrative business to me, this slave trading. Going to all that trouble, rounding everybody up, only to throw them all overboard.

Captain Fitzgerald: No, it's very lucrative.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: If only we could corroborate Cinque's story somehow with evidence of some kind.

Captain Fitzgerald: The inventory. If you look, there's a notation made on May tenth, correcting the number of slaves on board, reducing their number by fifty.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: What does that mean?

Captain Fitzgerald: Well, if you look at it in conjunction with Cinque's testimony, I would say that it means this: The Tecora crew have greatly underestimated the amount of provisions required for their journey, and solved the problem by throwing fifty people overboard.

William S. Holabird: I am looking at the same inventory, Captain, and I am sorry, I don't see where it says, Today we threw fifty slaves overboard', on May tenth or any other day.

Captain Fitzgerald: As, of course, you would not.

William S. Holabird: I do see that the cargo weight changed. They reduced the poundage, I see. But that is all.

Captain Fitzgerald: It's simple, ghastly arithmetic.

William S. Holabird: Well, for you, perhaps. I may need a quill and parchment, and a better imagination.

Captain Fitzgerald: And what poundage do you imagine the entry may refer to, sir? A mast and sails perhaps?

Roger Sherman Baldwin: On the other hand, let's say they aren't slaves. If they aren't slaves, in which case they were illegally acquired, weren't they? Forget mutiny, forget piracy, forget murder and all the rest. Those are subsequent irrelevant occurrences. Ignore everything but the pre-eminent issue at hand. The wrongful transfer of stolen goods. Either way, we win.

Lewis Tappan: Sir, this war must be waged on the battlefield of righteousness.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: The what?

Amistad Slave 1: [in Mende] He reminds me of that Fula of Baoma, you know the one who hires himself to scrape elephant dung from the crop rows.

Amistad Slave 2: [in Mende] A dung-scraper might be just the kind of man we need right now.

Roger Sherman Baldwin: [point to a map] Here, Africa? Is this where you're from? A-fri-ca?

John Quincy Adams: What is their story, by the way?

Theodore Joadson: Sir?

John Quincy Adams: What is their story?

Theodore Joadson: Why, they're um...they're from west Africa.

John Quincy Adams: [Joadson exhales and looks confused] No. What is their story? Mr. Joadson, you're from where originally?

Theodore Joadson: Why, Georgia, sir.

John Quincy Adams: Georgia.

Theodore Joadson: Yes, sir.

John Quincy Adams: [Joadson smiles and nods; laughs] Does that pretty much sum up what you are? A Georgian? Is that your story? No...you're an ex-slave who's devoted his life to the abolition of slavery, and overcoming the obstacles and hardships along the way, I should imagine. That's your story, isn't it? You and this young so-called lawyer have proven you know what they are. They're Africans. Congratulations. What you don't know, and as far as I can tell haven't bothered in the least to discover, is who they are. Right?

Theodore Joadson: There remains one task undone. One vital task the Founding Fathers left to their sons...

John Quincy Adams: Yes?

Theodore Joadson: ...before their thirteen colonies could precisely be called United States. And that task, Sir, as you well know, is crushing slavery.

Justice Joseph Story: [[w:Pinckney's Treaty|our treaty of 1795; [w:Henry Baldwin (judge)|one dissent] In the case of the United States of America versus the Amistad Africans, it is the opinion of this Court that ] with Spain, on which the prosecution has primarily based its arguments, is inapplicable. While it is clearly stipulated in Article 9 that, and I quote, "seized ships and cargo are to be returned entirely to their proprietary," the end of quote, it has not been shown to the Court's satisfaction that these particular Africans fit that description. We are then left with the alternative: that they are not slaves, and therefore, cannot be considered merchandise, but are rather free individuals with certain legal and moral rights, including the right to engage in insurrection against those who would deny them their freedom. And, therefore, over ], it is the Court's judgment that the defendants are to be released from custody at once, and if they so choose, to be returned to their homes in Africa.

John Quincy Adams: [to the Supreme Court; [James Madison; [Alexander Hamilton; [Benjamin Franklin; [Thomas Jefferson; [George Washington; [John Adams] ], ], ], ], ]...]. We've long resisted asking you for guidance. Perhaps we have feared in doing so, we might acknowledge that our individuality, which we so, so revere, is not entirely our own. Perhaps we've feared an...an appeal to you might be taken for weakness. But, we've come to understand, finally, that this is not so. We understand now, we've been made to understand, and to embrace the understanding...that who we are is who we were. We desperately need your strength and wisdom to triumph over our fears, our prejudices, ourselves. Give us the courage to do what is right. And if it means civil war? Then let it come. And when it does, may it be, finally, the last battle of the American Revolution.

John Quincy Adams: [to the Supreme Court] Well, gentlemen, I must say I differ with the keen minds of the South and with our President, who apparently shares their views, offering that the natural state of mankind is instead - and I know this is a controversial idea - is freedom. Is freedom. And the proof is the length to which a man, woman or child will go to regain it once taken. He will break loose his chains. He will decimate his enemies. He will try and try and try, against all odds, against all prejudices, to get home.

John Quincy Adams: [to the Supreme Court; [Patrick Henry; [Declaration of Independence; tears papers in half] This man is black. We can all see that. But, can we also see as easily, that which is equally true? That he is the only true hero in this room. Now, if he were white, he wouldn't be standing before this court fighting for his life. If he were white and his enslavers were British, he wouldn't be standing, so heavy the weight of the medals and honors we would bestow upon him. Songs would be written about him. The great authors of our times would fill books about him. His story would be told and retold, in our classrooms. Our children, because we would make sure of it, would know his name as well as they know ]'s. Yet, if the South is right, what are we to do with that embarrassing, annoying document, the ]? What of its conceits? "All men created equal," "inalienable rights," "life, liberty," and so on and so forth? What on Earth are we to do with this? I have a modest suggestion.

John Quincy Adams: [to the Supreme Court] This is the most important case ever to come before this court. Because what it in fact concerns is the very nature of man.

John Quincy Adams: [to the Supreme Court] Your Honors, I derive much consolation from the fact that my colleague, Mr. Baldwin here, has argued the case in so able, and so complete a manner, as to leave me scarcely anything to say. However...why are we here? How is it that a simple, plain property issue should now find itself so ennobled as to be argued before the Supreme Court of the United States of America?

John Quincy Adams: Well when I was an attorney, a long time ago, young man, I err...I realized after much trial and error, that in the courtroom, whoever tells the best story wins. In unlawyer-like fashion, I give you that scrap of wisdom free of charge.