Before Kamala Harris became Biden's running mate, Shirley Chisholm and other
Black women aimed for the White House
THE CONVERSATION
08/12/2020
36SHARES
By Sharon Austin | -
U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, the American daughter of Jamaican and Indian
immigrants, is Joe Biden's choice for vice president. If Biden wins in
November, Harris would break three centuries-old barriers to become the
nation's first female vice president, first Black vice president and first
Black female vice president.
Geraldine Ferraro was the first female vice-presidential candidate on a
major party ticket, in 1984. In 2008, Alaska's then-governor Sarah Palin was
Republican John McCain's running mate.
Before Harris was picked as Biden's running mate, she was his competitor for
the Democratic presidential nomination. She is one of many Black American
women who have aimed for the highest office in the land despite great odds.
Hands that once picked cotton
African Americans have endured many hurdles to political power in the United
States, among them slavery, Jim Crow and disenfranchisement.
Black women, in particular, have hit barrier upon barrier. Women didn't gain
the right to vote in the U.S. until 1920, and even then Black people - women
among them - still couldn't vote in most of the South. In the 1960s, Black
women helped organize the civil rights movement but were kept out of
leadership positions.
As a political science professor, I address issues like these in my
government and minority politics classes. But I also teach my students that
Black women have a history of political ambition and achievement. As the
Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. said in 1984 about the progress Black voters made
last century, "Hands that once picked cotton will now pick a president."
Today, Black female mayors lead several of the United States' biggest
cities, including Atlanta, Chicago and San Francisco. Black women are police
chiefs, gubernatorial candidates, and, in growing numbers, congresswomen.
Now, Black women, who once had no chance of even voting for president - much
less being president - will see one of their own a step away from the Oval
Office.
Biden allies have reportedly suggested that he would only serve one term if
elected because of his age - Biden would be 78 on Inauguration Day - but his
campaign officially denies that possibility. Either way, his vice president
would be in a powerful position for the 2024 campaign.
Harris is also of Indian descent, making her place on the ticket a
meaningful first for two communities of color.
'Unsuitable' for the job?
Kamala Harris is a registered Democrat who served as California's attorney
general and later one of the state's U.S. senators. But, historically, most
Black female presidential candidates have run as independents.
In 1968, 38-year-old Charlene Mitchell of Ohio became the first Black woman
to run for president, as a communist. Like many other African Americans born
in the 1930s, Mitchell joined the Communist Party because of its emphasis on
racial and gender equality. Black female communists fought Jim Crow,
lynchings and unfair labor practices for men and women of all races.
A portrait of Charlene Mitchell
Charlene Mitchell, America's first Black female presidential candidate.
Wikimedia Commons
Mitchell's presidential campaign, which focused on civil rights and poverty,
was probably doomed from the start. In 1968, many states didn't allow
communists on the ballot. Media outlets from the Boston Globe to the Chicago
Tribune also discussed Mitchell's "unsuitability" as a candidate because she
was both Black and female. Mitchell received just 1,075 votes.
Other independent Black female presidential candidates have been community
organizer Margaret Wright, who ran on the People's Party ticket in 1976;
Isabell Masters, a teacher who created her own third party, called Looking
Back and ran in 1984, 1992 and 2004; and teacher Monica Moorehead of the
Workers World Party ticket, who ran in 1996, 2000 and 2016.
In 2008, the year Barack Obama was elected president, Cynthia McKinney, a
former U.S. representative from Georgia, was a nominee of the Green Party.
And in 2012, Peta Lindsay ran to unseat President Obama from the left, on
the Party for Socialism and Liberation ticket.
Cynthia McKinney, h/t Wikipedia.
Only one Black woman has ever pursued the Republican nomination: Angel Joy
Charvis, a religious conservative from Florida, who wanted to use her 1999
candidacy to "to recruit a new breed of Republican."
Unbought and unbossed
These Black female presidential candidates were little known. But as the
first Black female member of Congress, Shirley Chisholm had years of
experience in public office and a national reputation when she became the
first Black American and the first woman to seek the Democratic presidential
nomination in 1972. Chisholm's campaign slogan: "Unbought and Unbossed."
Chisholm, who mostly paid for her campaign on her credit card, focused on
civil rights and poverty.
She became the target of vehement sexism. One New York Times article from
June 1972 described her appearance as, "[Not] beautiful. Her face is bony
and angular, her nose wide and flat, her eyes small almost to beadiness, her
neck and limbs scrawny. Her protruding teeth probably account in part for
her noticeable lisp."
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Chisholm received little support from either Black or female voters and won
not a single primary.
The Black women who followed in Chisholm's footsteps from Congress to the
Democratic presidential primary, including Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley Braun
and Harris herself, have seen little more success. Harris was among the
first 2020 Democratic primary candidates to drop out, in December 2019.
Challenges for Black women
Why did these women's candidacies fail?
In most cases, my research finds, America's Black female presidential
candidates haven't made the ballot. Those who did had trouble raising funds.
And because their candidacies weren't taken seriously by the media, they had
trouble getting their messages heard. Historically Black female presidential
candidates have received no real support from any segment of American
voters, including African Americans and women. Generally, people - even
those who might have been heartened by the idea that someone who looked like
them could aspire to the White House - thought they couldn't win.
As a vice president for two terms who had a major role in governing under
Barack Obama, Joe Biden knows what the office entails. He has now selected a
woman who he believes can not only help him win the election but also to
govern if he is elected. It is a watershed moment for African Americans,
Asian Americans and women who've so long been excluded from so many aspects
of politics.