"Barbara Charline Jordan"(February 21,1936-January 17,1996)

Was an American Politician who was a leader, and a product of the Civil Rights movement.She was the first African-American elected to the Texas Senate after reconstruction and the first

 

Southern black woman ever elected to the U.S. House of representatives.She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom,among numerous other honors.She became the first African-American woman to be interred in the Texas State Cemetery.The main terminal of Austin-Bergstorm Airport is named for her.She campaigned for the Texas House of Representatives in 1962 and 1964.Her persistence won her a seat in the Texas Senate in 1966,becoming the first African-American state senator since 1883 and the first black woman to serve in that body.Re-elected to a full term in the Texas senate in 1968,she served until 1972.She was the first African-American female to serve as president pro tem of the state senate and served one day,June 10,1972,as acting Governor of Texas.In 1972,she was elected to the United States House of Representatives,becoming the first black woman from a southern state to serve in the House.She was also the first woman to represent Texas in the House in her own right (the first woman from Texas,Lera Thomas,had been elected as stand-in for her husband Albert Thomas.She received extensive support from former President Lyndon Johnson,who helped her secure a position on the House Judiciary Committee.In 1974,she made and influential,televised speech before the House Judiciary Committee supporting the impeachment of President Richard Nixon.Barbara was a mentioned as a possible running mate to Jimmy Carter in 1976,and that year she became the first African-American to deliver the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention.Her speech in New York that summer was ranked 5th in "Top 100 American Speeches of the 20 century list and was considered by many historians to have been the best convention keynote speech in modern history.Despite being a candidate she received one delegate vote (0.03%) for president at the convention.Barbara retired from politics in 1979 and became an adjunct professor teaching ethics at the University of Texas at Austin Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs.She again was a keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention in 1992.In 1995, Barbara chaired a Congressional commission that advocated increased restriction of immigration,called for all U.S. residents to carry a national identity card and increased penalties on employers that violated U.S. regulations.Then-President Clinton endorsed the Jordan Commission's proposals.While she was chair of the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform she argued that "it is both a right and a responsibility of a democratic society to manage policy who cite willingness to penalize employers who violate US  immigration regulations,to tighten borders security,and to oppose amnesty or any other pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants and to broaden the grounds for the deportation of legal immigrants.She supported the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977,legislation that required banks to lend and make services available to undeserved poor and minority communities.She supported the renewal of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and expansion of that act to cover language minorities.This extended protection to Hispanics in Texas and was opposed by Texas Governor Dolph Briscoe and Secretary of State Mark White.In 1973,Barbara began to suffer from multiple sclerosis.She had difficulty climbing stairs,and she started using a cane and eventually a wheelchair.She kept the state of her health out of the press so well that in the KUT radio documentary Rediscovering Barbara Jordan,President Bill Clinton stated he wanted to nominate her for the United States Supreme Court,but by the time he could do so,Barbara health problems prevented him from nominating her.Her companion of close to 30 years was Nancy Earl.Barbara met Nancy and educational psychologist who would became and occasional speech writer in addition to Barbara partner,on a camping trip in the late 1960s.Barbara never publicly acknowledged her sexual orientation,but in her obituary,the Houston Chronicle mentioned her long relationship with Nancy.After her initial statewide races,advisers warned her to become more discreet and not bring and female companions on the campaign trail.Barbara narrowly escaped death by drowning in July 1988,when Nancy pulled her from their backyard swimming pool.Her death was caused from complications of pneumonia.In 1993 she was honored with the Elizabeth Blackwell Award from Hobart and William Smith Colleges.Barbara was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1994.The many other honors given to her include her election into both the Texas and National Women's Halls of Fame;she was awarded the prestigious United States Military Academy's Silvanus Thayer Award,becoming only the second woman awardee.Upon death Barbara lay in state at the LBJ Library on the campus of The University Texas at Austin.She was buried in the Texas State Cemetery in Austin,and was the first black woman interred there.Her papers are housed at the Barbara Jordan Archives at Texas Southern University.The main terminal at Austin-Bergstorm international Airport is named after her,as are an elementary school in Odessa,Texas,a middle school in Cibolo,Texas;Barbara Jordan high school in Houston and YMCA in Martinville,Indiana.The Kaiser Family Foundation currently operates the Barbara Jordan Health Policy Scholars,a fellowship designed for people of color who are college juniors,seniors, and recent graduates as a summer experience working in a congressional office.On March 27,2000,a play on Jordan's life premiered at the Victory Garden Theatre in Chicago,Illinois.Titled "Voice of Hope",Kristine Thatcher's biographical evocation of Jordan's life played in theaters from San Francisco to New York.On April 24,2009,a Barbara Jordan statue was unveiled at the University of Texas at Austin where Barbara taught at the time of her death.The Barbara Jordan statue campaign was paid for by a student fee increase approved by the University of Texas Board of Regents.The effort was originally spearheaded by the 2002-2003 Tapee class of the Texas Orange Jackets,the "oldest women's organization at the University"(of Texas at Austin).Many of her speeches have been collected in a 2007 publication from the University of Texas Press,Barbara Jordan:Speaking the Truth with Eloquent Thunder.In her namesake,the Jordan/Rustin Coalition (JRC) was created in California in 2000.This organization seeks to mobilize gay and lesbian African American to aid in the passage of marriage in the state of California.Along with Bayard Rustin,a Civil Rights leader and close confidante of Martin Luther King,Barbara is remembered for her advocacy of progressive politics."The mission of the JRC is to empower Black same-gender loving, lesbian,gay,bisexual and transgender individuals and families in Greater Los Angeles,to promote equal marriage rights and to advocate for fair treatment of everyone without regard to race,sexual orientation,gender identity or gender expression.