Shirley Anita St. Hill Chisholm was the first African American woman in Congress (1968) and the first woman and African American to seek the nomination for president of the United States from one of the two major political parties (1972). Her motto and title of her autobiography—Unbought and Unbossed—illustrates her outspoken advocacy for women and minorities during her seven terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Born in Brooklyn, New York, on November 30, 1924, Chisholm was the oldest of four daughters to immigrant parents Charles St. Hill, a factory worker from Guyana, and Ruby Seale St. Hill, a seamstress from Barbados. She graduated from Brooklyn Girls’ High in 1942 and from Brooklyn College cum laude in 1946, where she won prizes on the debate team. Although professors encouraged her to consider a political career, she replied that she faced a “double handicap” as both Black and female. Initially, Chisholm worked as a nursery school teacher. In 1949, she married Conrad Q. Chisholm, a private investigator (they divorced in 1977). She earned a master’s degree from Columbia University in early childhood education in 1951. By 1960, she was a consultant to the New York City Division of Day Care. Ever aware of racial and gender inequality, she joined local chapters of the League of Women Voters, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Urban League, as well as the Democratic Party club in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. In 1964, Chisholm ran for and became the second African American in the New York State Legislature. After court-ordered redistricting created a new, heavily Democratic, district in her neighborhood, in 1968 Chisholm sought—and won—a seat in Congress. There, “Fighting Shirley” introduced more than 50 pieces of legislation and championed racial and gender equality, the plight of the poor, and ending the Vietnam War. She was a co-founder of the National Women's Political Caucus in 1971, and in 1977 became the first Black woman and second woman ever to serve on the powerful House Rules Committee. That year she married Arthur Hardwick Jr., a New York State legislator. Discrimination followed Chisholm’s quest for the 1972 Democratic Party presidential nomination. She was blocked from participating in televised primary debates, and after taking legal action, was permitted to make just one speech. Still, students, women, and minorities followed the “Chisholm Trail.” She entered 12 primaries and garnered 152 of the delegates’ votes (10% of the total)—despite an under-financed campaign and contentiousness from the predominantly male Congressional Black Caucus. Chisholm retired from Congress in 1983. She taught at Mount Holyoke College and co-founded the National Political Congress of Black Women. In 1991 she moved to Florida, and later declined the nomination to become U.S. Ambassador to Jamaica due to ill health. Of her legacy, Chisholm said, “I want to be remembered as a woman … who dared to be a catalyst of change.” MLA - Michals, Debra. "Shirley Chisholm." National Women's History Museum. National Women's History Museum, 2015. Date accessed. Chicago - Michals, Debra. "Shirley Chisholm." National Women's History Museum. 2015. www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/shirley-chisholm.
Abrams is now one of the most prominent African American female politicians in the United States.
Abigail Adams was an early advocate for women's rights.
A progressive social reformer and activist, Jane Addams was on the frontline of the settlement house movement and was the first American woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize.
Toshiko Akiyoshi changed the face of jazz music over her sixty-year career. As one of few women and Asian musicians in the jazz world, Akiyoshi infused Japanese culture, sounds, and instruments into her music.
In this lesson, students will consider what life in America was like prior to Roe v. Wade.
Rosie the Riveter Oral Histories
This mini lesson will introduce students to Ida B. Wells through a primary source and invite students to explore the geography of American lynchings through an interactive map.
This lesson features a series of student-centered grouping strategies and discussion forums that utilize primary and secondary sources accounts regarding real-life ‘Rosie the Riveters’ and their contributions to America’s victory in the Second World War.
Texas congresswoman Barbara Jordan (1936-1996) rose to the national stage from Houston’s largely African American Fifth Ward, becoming a public defender of the U.S. Constitution and a leading presence in Democratic Party politics for two decades. She was the first Black woman elected to the Texas state senate and the first Black Texan in Congress. As a member of the House Judiciary Committee, she gave the influential opening speech of Richard Nixon’s 1974 impeachment hearings. She retired after three terms in Congress to become a professor and policy advocate.
Barbara Jordan: Early Life and Education
Barbara Charline Jordan was born February 21, 1936, in her parents’ home in Houston. Her father, Benjamin Jordan, was a Baptist minister and warehouse clerk. Her mother Arlyne was a maid, housewife and church teacher.
Did you know? Texas congresswoman Barbara Jordan's great-grandfather, Edward Patton, was one of several Black representatives who served in the Texas legislature during Reconstruction.
Jordan attended the segregated Phillis Wheatley High School, where a career day speech by Edith Sampson, a Black lawyer, inspired her to become an attorney. Jordan was a member of the inaugural class at Texas Southern University, a Black college hastily created by the Texas legislature to avoid having to integrate the University of Texas. There Jordan joined the debate team and helped lead it to national renown. The team famously tied Harvard’s debaters when they came to Houston.
Jordan graduated magna cum laude from Texas Southern University in 1956 and was accepted at Boston University’s law school. Three years later, Jordan earned her law degree as one of only two African American women in her class. She passed the Massachusetts and Texas bars and returned to Houston to open a law office in the Fifth Ward.
Barbara Jordan: Texas State Senator
Jordan volunteered for John F. Kennedy’s 1960 presidential campaign, heading a Harris County voter drive that yielded an 80-percent turnout. She twice ran unsuccessfully for the Texas House before winning the 1966 contest for a newly created Texas State Senate district.
In Austin she won the respect of her colleagues and worked to pass a state minimum wage law that covered farmworkers. In her final year in the state senate, Jordan’s colleagues elected her president pro tem, allowing her to serve as governor for a day—June 10, 1972—in accordance with state tradition.
Barbara Jordan: Years in Congress
Five months later Jordan ran for Congress as the Democratic nominee for Houston’s 18th District. She won, becoming the first African American woman from a Southern state to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. With support from her close advisor Lyndon B. Johnson, Jordan was appointed to key posts including on the House Judiciary Committee.
On July 25, 1974, Jordan gave the 15-minute opening statement of the Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearing for Richard Nixon. Her speech was a staunch defense of the U.S. Constitution (which, she noted, had not initially included African Americans in its “We, the people”) and its checks and balances designed to prevent abuse of power. She said, “I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.”
The impeachment speech helped lead to Nixon’s resignation over the Watergate scandal and won Jordan national acclaim for her rhetoric, intellect and integrity. Two years later she was asked to deliver the keynote address at the 1976 Democratic National Convention—another first for an African American woman.
While in Congress Jordan worked on legislation promoting women’s rights, supported the Equal Rights Amendment and cosponsored a bill that would have granted housewives Social Security benefits based on their domestic labor.
READ MORE: How Barbara Jordan's 1974 Speech Marked a Turning Point in the Watergate Scandal
Barbara Jordan: Retirement, Health Troubles, Final Honors
Jordan retired from Congress in 1979 to become a professor at the Lyndon Baines Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. She became an active public speaker and advocate, amassing 25 honorary doctorates. Her vehement opposition helped derail George Bush’s nomination of Robert Bork (who had opposed many civil rights cases) to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Jordan, who had suffered from multiple sclerosis since 1973, was wheelchair-bound by the time she was invited to give her second Democratic convention keynote address in 1992. Until her death she remained private about her illnesses, which finally included diabetes and cancer.
In 1994 Bill Clinton awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian honor. Jordan died of leukemia-related pneumonia on January 17, 1996. Breaking barriers even in death, she became the first African American to be buried among the governors, senators and congressmen in the Texas State Cemetery.
READ MORE: Black History Milestones: A Timeline