The women of my youth...
Just wanted to drop a few names like Bella Abzug, Barbara Jordan, Betty Freidan, Angela Davis, Margaret Chase Smith, and the names on the "The Ticket That Might Have Been." These are the women I learned from as young woman leaving high school and entering college and the work force. These are the women I learned from as I started to negotiate the greater society outside of the home I grew up in. These were some of the women who informed my consciousness. As long as I breathe I will tell of these women and the many like them who stood for the liberty that comes from not tying someone to their biology or their color.
This post is to remember and to instruct those who are coming behind us. The vision remains. We do not forget.
http://www.pbs.org/pov/chisholm/special_ticket.php
From the Archives: "The Ticket that Might Have Been"
The January 1973 issue of Ms. Magazine featured a cover story by Gloria Steinem on the impact of Shirley Chisholm's candidacy.
Ms. Magazine cover featuring Shirley Chisholm
View the article in the original layout from the 1973 issue of Ms. Magazine
PRESIDENT CHISHOLM
"I am a candidate for the Presidency of the United States. I make that statement proudly, in the full knowledge that, as a black person and as a female person, I do not have a chance of actually gaining that office in this election year. I make that statement seriously, knowing that my candidacy itself can change the face and future of American politics — that it will be important to the needs and hopes of every one of you — even though, in the conventional sense, I will not win."
— June 4, 1972
The election is over, and there will be a familiar face, a familiar white and male face, in the White House for four more years. The months of feverish work and hard-earned dollars that went into the Presidential candidacy of Shirley Chisholm are only memories now. Sometimes it seems that they are discussed seriously only when veterans of her campaign happen to get together and reminisce.
In fact, there is some uncertainty and even disappointment in those discussions, too. What effect did the Chisholm campaign have on the country? On the excluded groups it was meant to help and encourage? What ideas did it launch or lives did it change? And finally, the heart of all the questions: was it all worth it?
From reading the post-Convention and postelection reporting, it's impossible to tell. The Chisholm candidacy was rarely analyzed while it was going on, and even less so in traditional postmortems. Before and after the primaries, there were occasional tantalizing hints of Chisholm's significance. The Harris poll of last February, for instance, found the Congresswoman getting 35 percent of the vote among black Independents and black Democrats, and a support among woman of all races that was three times greater than her support among men. (From this, the Harris summary concluded, "Ms. Chisholm must now be considered a distinct threat to Mayor Lindsay, Senator McGovern, and former Senator Eugene McCarthy in vying for the liberal and left-of-center vote.".... more
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certain people, when they speak, they just.......GRAB you - certainly true of Ms. Jordan 