‘Unbought and Unbossed’ are the two words Chisholm described herself within the publication of her autobiography, the title her life’s motto. This sums Chisholm up entirely, demonstrating unique outspokenness for women and for minorities throughout a period of U.S. and global history which in every moment rejected Chisholm’s place in the world. The difficulties of her race and her gender (something she stated was a ‘double handicap’) do not appear to have shaken Shirley Anita St. Hill Chisholm too much however; she was the first African American woman in Congress in 1968 and the first African American to seek nomination for U.S president from either of the two major political parties in 1972.
This profile gives an account of Chisholm’s life, looking into what brought “Fighting Shirley” into the Congress floor, and also what kept her there.
Born in November 1924 to immigrant parents in Brooklyn, New York, Chisholm and her younger sisters were sent into the care of their maternal grandmother in Barbados at the age of five, her parents too busy working full time to care for their young children. She returned to New York in 1934 at the age of fifteen. Her time in Barbados gave her a pronounced accent which she retained throughout her life and as for the influence of her grandmother, Chisholm would say in adulthood that her grandmother gave her ‘strength, dignity, and love. I learned from an early age that I was somebody. I didn’t need the black revolution to tell me that.’ Chisholm also credited much of her success and intelligence to this upbringing, citing it as ‘strict, traditional’. Whilst in Barbados, Chisholm was exposed to a number of anti-colonial independence movements, whilst her father supported political activist Marcus Garvey in New York.
On her return to New York, she attended an integrated school in Brooklyn from 1939, doing well enough academically to be named vice-president of the Junior Arista honour society. She was then offered scholarships at Vassar and Oberin Colleges, though she eventually chose to stay in Brooklyn, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts with a major in sociology and a minor in Spanish. During her time at the college Chisholm directed her energy into the Harriet Tubman Society, where she promoted the inclusion of black soldiers in the U.S. military, African-American history modules at the college and more women in the student body Government. Following graduation, Chisholm worked as a teacher’s aide a th
e Mt. Calvary Child Care Center in Harlem from 1946-1953. At the same time, she was attending classes at night to earn an MA in childhood education from Teachers College of Columbia University in 1951.
After leaving her job in Harlem, Chisholm became the director of the Friend in Need Nursery in Brooklyn, and from 1954 to 1959 the director of the Hamilton-Madison Child Care Center, in lower Manhattan. Most notable is of course, her career in politics, starting from 1953 Chisholm engaged primarily in black focussed politics, starting with the BSPL which had originally sought to elect the first black judge in Brooklyn and later to support civil rights, protest racial discrimination and improve financial services in Brooklyn. She would eventually clash with the group’s founder Wesley Holder over her effort to give female members more input. In the next few years, she would work for the Brooklyn Democratic Clubs and the League of Women Voters, the Political League, and the Brooklyn branch of the National Association of College Women, then, in 1960, the Unity Democracy Club, a racially and gender-integrated organisation, here working with Thomas R. Jones who she would later replace as the Democratic Primary in the New York State Assembly in 1964 despite initial opposition according to her race and her gender. Thus, Chisholm was a member of the NY State Assembly from 1965-1968, using her time to extend domestic workers, sponsoring the introduction of a SEEK programme in New York (Search for Education, Elevation and Knowledge), and arguing against the state’s English literacy test as if someone “functions better in his native language … [it does not mean they are] illiterate”. In 1968 Chisholm moved from state politics to national, running for the U.S. House of Representatives from New York’s 12th congressional district which thanks to some redrawing of congressional districts was dominated by black voters. Winning with her slogan “Unbought and unbossed”. Chisholm became the first black woman elected to congress, sitting as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for seven terms, during which time she consistently promoted racial and gender equality, support for the working classes and poor population, lobbied against the Vietnam War and introduced 50 acts/legislation. Furthermore, she was unwilling to let her success in politics be anomalous, in 1971 Chishom co-founded the National Women’s Political Caucus which continues to recruit, train and elect progressive, pro-choice women in American politics.
Chisholm for president
Chisholm announced her candidacy for president in January 1972, calling for a ‘bloodless revolution’ a the upcoming Democratic nomination convention. She became the first African American to run for a major party’s nomination for the presidency and the first woman to run for the Democratic party’s presidential nomination, although crucially she refused to run as a ‘black candidate’ or a ‘female candidate’. “I am not the candidate of black America, although I am black and proud. I am not the candidate for the women’s movement of this country, although I am a woman and equally proud of that. I am the candidate of the people and my presence before you symbolises a new era in American political history.” Chisholm’s effort was, perhaps unsurprisingly, unsuccessful, hugely underfunded and mostly considered to be a symbolic rather than genuine candidate, she stated later that in her political career, she encountered more discrimination as a woman than for being black. Unlike some other women we’ve discussed so far this month, she did however have the full support of her husband, who at the start of her candidacy served as her bodyguard. Her support was based upon those who were ethnically diverse and were largely women, and whilst generally popular politically, she struggled to gain the popular vote. Throughout the campaign, Chisholm had struck up an unusual friendship with her political rival George Wallace. This friendship would later serve her political work well, helping her to push through legislation to give domestic workers the minimum wage.
Post presidential campaign
From 1977 to 1981 Chisholm served as Secretary of the Democratic Caucus, then worked to help inner-city residents, invest in education, health care and other social services, worked to reduce discrimination against women and Native American land rights and for the better. She would oppose the Vietnam War, the U.S. draft and weapon developments, and support the Equal Rights Amendment, although specified that women should not receive specific health and safety laws as this would simply ‘continue’ traditional discrimination of women. She would focus on the “double discrimination” faced by black women, which some historians have argued had an impact on the development of the feminist movement in the 1970s. However, many others considered her too ineffectual in cases of liberal, black and feminism issues, for example, Chisholm would not support Bella Apzug’s campaigns for U.S. senator and New York mayor in 1976 and 1977 respectively; nor Elizabeth Holtzman’s congressional challenge; nor did she support Percy Sutton’s mayoral effort, also in 1977. The press began to call her apparent ignorance of black and women's issues the ‘Chisholm problem’, and critics focussed on the ‘unbossed’ part of her slogan, arguing in disparaging articles that bossed was exactly what she was.
There are several reasons Chisholm may have decided to leave congress in 1979, her second husband had been in an accident, and the “Reagan Revolution” pushed liberal politics into a fairly unlikeable place. She retired officially in 1982, leaving congress entirely in 1983 and settling back into a career in education. She didn’t exactly leave politics behind though, establishing the National Black Women’s Political Caucus in 1984 with C. Delores Tucker (The organisation would later become
the National Congress of Black Women), she would continue to campaign for politicians and also helped set up the group: African-American Women for
Reproductive Freedom in 1990. Bill Clinton would go on to name her Ambassador for Jamaica, in 1993, though she was ultimately too unwell to undertake her role.
Chisholm died on the 1st of January 2005, the
inscription on her legend reads
“Unbossed and Unbought”.
Sources
Hill, Debra, ‘Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005)’, National Women’s History Museum, (2015), <https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/shirley-chisholm>, [26/02/2023]
‘Shirley Chisholm (November 30, 1924-January 1, 2005)’, African American Heritage, < https://www.archives.gov/research/african-americans/individuals/shirley-chisholm >, [26/02/2023]
‘Shirley Chisholm for President’, Smithsonian, < https://nmaahc.si.edu/shirley-chisholm-president>, [26/02/2023]
‘Shirley Chisholm’, History.com, (18/12/2009/13/04/2022), < https://www.history.com/topics/us-government-and-politics/shirley-chisholm>, [26/02/2023]
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