Intro
Library of Congress, call number LC-USZ62-995
CREDIT: Library of Congress
ALT: Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington signing U.S. Constitution (Library of Congress)
Drafters of the U.S. Constitution lived in an era when governments typically were run by white men. When the document outlining the American government was written in 1787, it would have been difficult to imagine that 221 years later, African Americans and women would be running for any elected office, let alone the presidency.
In 2008, a major political party for the first time nominated an African American for the office of U.S. president, but others throughout U.S. history paved the way for Barack Obama by overcoming stereotypes that hindered their winning elected office.
1855
Library of Congress, Call number SC3512
CREDIT: Library of Congress
ALT: Portrait photo of John Mercer Langston (Library of Congress)
The Washington Post described John Mercer Langston as “the Obama before Obama.” Like President Obama, Langston was a lawyer and community organizer. Langston, the son of a white planter and a freed slave, is believed to be the first African-American elected official in the United States. In 1855, he began serving as township clerk of Brownhelm, Ohio.
Langston left a powerful legacy by advocating African-American voting rights, helping found the Howard University School of Law in Washington and representing the United States as a diplomat.
1870
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/graphic/large/HiramRevels.jpg (U.S. Senate)
CREDIT: U.S. Senate
ALT: Hiram Revels (U.S. Senate)
After the U.S. Civil War ended and Mississippi rejoined the Union, Hiram Revels was elected by his fellow Mississippi legislators to become the first African-American U.S. senator.
Revels, a Republican, initially was not completely welcome in the Senate: Those who opposed his inclusion argued Revels had not been a U.S. citizen for the nine years mandated by the U.S. Constitution because Revels, although born in the United States to free black parents, had been a citizen for only four years, since the passage of the 1866 Civil Rights Act. A 48-8 Senate vote allowed Revels to take his seat.
1887
Photo in g/press/dgi/photos/Austein photos/salter.jpg
CREDIT: © Selter House Museum
ALT: Portrait photo of Susanna Madora Selter (Selter House Museum)
Susanna Madora Selter is elected mayor of Argonia, Kansas, becoming the first female U.S. mayor years before women received the right to vote nationwide. Women in most Kansas cities earned the right to vote just weeks before Selter’s election.
Some men nominated the 27-year-old Selter for mayor as a joke, but the joke was on them when she won the election. Newspapers nationwide covered Selter’s first city council meeting and most gave positive reviews. As news of her election traveled around the world, she received congratulations from people in France, Italy, Germany and other countries.
1941
96070102639
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Franklin D. Roosevelt in wheelchair with girl (AP Images)
In a rare image, President Franklin D. Roosevelt sits in his wheelchair. Although most Americans did not know it, Roosevelt had lost his mobility after a 1921 bout with polio.
In his campaigns for New York governor and U.S. president, trusted helpers unobtrusively assisted Roosevelt with standing and walking. Today, many Americans look to the Democrat as an example of a person overcoming great physical challenges to become a powerful leader.
1960
600912022
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: John F. Kennedy at podium before audience (AP Images)
In September 1960, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy speaks to a group of clergymen of the Houston Ministerial Association in Texas, when many Americans were wondering if the Catholic from Massachusetts could put his country ahead of his church. Kennedy said this:
“I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party’s candidate for president, who happens also to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my church on public matters, and the church does not speak for me.”
1964
6402220138
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Margaret Chase Smith in doorway shaking homeowner’s hand (AP Images)
Margaret Chase Smith greets a New Hampshire voter during the Republican presidential primary.
Smith became famous in 1950 for opposing Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist campaign. She represented Maine in both the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate — the first woman to serve in both chambers — and some speculated she would be the 1952 vice-presidential candidate.
In 1964, Smith sought the presidential nomination. Although she became the first woman to be considered for the presidential nomination at a national convention, she lost to Barry Goldwater.
1972
720320033
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Close-up of Shirley Chisholm (AP Images)
Democratic presidential candidate Shirley Chisholm speaks in Raleigh, North Carolina, in March 1972.
Long before Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham Clinton, Chisholm — the first black woman elected to Congress and a champion of minority rights — tried to become the first African-American and first female president.
Chisholm struggled to get voters and the news media to take her seriously — newscaster Walter Cronkite announced her candidacy by saying “a new hat — rather, a bonnet — was tossed into the Democratic presidential race today.” But Chisholm ultimately earned 152 delegates before losing the nomination to George McGovern.
1981
050903027386
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Close-up of Tom Lantos (AP Images)
Tom Lantos, a Democrat from California, served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1981 until his death in 2008. Lantos is one of many immigrants to serve in Congress, but he is the only Holocaust survivor to do so.
“It is only in the United States that a penniless survivor of the Holocaust … [could have] had the privilege of serving the last three decades of his life as a member of Congress,” said the Hungarian-born senator. (See “United States Mourns Lantos.”)
In 2011, eight foreign-born members are serving in the House of Representatives, two in the Senate.
1984
840905050
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Geraldine Ferraro and Walter Mondale waving (AP Images)
Democratic presidential and vice-presidential nominees Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro campaign in Oregon. In accepting the nomination, the New York congresswoman said, “By choosing a woman to run for our nation’s second highest office, you sent a powerful signal to all Americans. There are no doors we cannot unlock. We will place no limits on achievement.”
Ferraro, a women’s rights activist, paraphrased John F. Kennedy: “To those who understand that our country cannot prosper unless we draw on the talents of all Americans we say … the issue is not what America can do for women, but what women can do for America.”
2007
070104018679
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Nancy Pelosi administering oath to Keith Ellison (AP Images)
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, left, administers the oath of office to Representative Keith Ellison, a Democrat from Minnesota.
In November 2006, Ellison was the first Muslim elected to the U.S. Congress, and he took the oath of office with his hand on the Quran. (See “Congressman Takes Oath on Jefferson’s Quran.”)
Administering his oath was another historic first: Nancy Pelosi, the first female speaker of the House of Representatives. (See “First Female Speaker To Preside at State of the Union.”)
2007
071020039732
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Bobby Jindal and family (AP Images)
Bobby Jindal, a Republican, celebrates his victory in the Louisiana governor’s election. Jindal, the son of Indian immigrants who came to the United States for better educational opportunities, is the first Indian-American governor and Louisiana’s first nonwhite governor since Reconstruction. (See “Louisiana Elects First Indian-American Governor.”)
U.S. governors have come from diverse backgrounds. Other governors include those with African, Asian and Caribbean roots, and some are immigrants themselves. (See “U.S. Governors Head American ‘Laboratories of Democracy’.”)
2008
070804015389
CREDIT: © AP Images
ALT: Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama clapping (AP Images)
New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Illinois Senator Barack Obama participate in a leadership forum in August 2007. As the 2008 field of candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination dwindled to Clinton and Obama, many Democrats were excited because they would help make history by nominating the first African American or woman for president from a major political party.
As pollster John Zogby explained, one of the reasons for the lengthy Democratic campaign in 2007–2008 was that “this is more than two personalities, Barack Obama versus Hillary Clinton. This is two warring demographics, each with a sense of destiny.” (See “Democratic Race Could Continue for Weeks or Months.”)
Obama went on to break ground as the first African-American presidential nominee of a major party and as the first African-American U.S. president.