Politics & Power Quote by Kathleen Sebelius

It’s a deliberately modest sentence that tries to do two jobs at once: mark progress without letting progress become an alibi. Sebelius opens by naming visible integration - “live, work, and learn together” - the everyday optics of a post-segregation America. That triad matters. It’s not just rhetorical rhythm; it’s a checklist of the spaces where the country likes to declare victory: neighborhoods, workplaces, schools. If those look mixed, the story goes, the problem must be mostly solved.

Then she flips the frame with “still injustice,” a blunt, almost impatient hinge word that refuses the “we’ve come so far” lullaby. The subtext is political as much as moral: integration is not the same thing as equality, and proximity doesn’t automatically produce power-sharing. “Together now” can mean shared rooms with unequal outcomes, shared institutions built on unequal rules. The line also signals a familiar coalition-building move in Democratic politics: reassure moderates by acknowledging gains, while keeping pressure on systems that reproduce disparities in policing, housing, health, and education.

Contextually, Sebelius comes from a governing, policy-minded tradition; the phrasing avoids inflammatory diagnosis in favor of a broad, defensible claim that can anchor legislation and enforcement rather than culture-war theater. It’s calibrated to be hard to argue with, precisely because it’s so unflashy. That’s the point: a reminder that the most stubborn injustices aren’t always the ones you can see from across the room.