On Westheimer Road in Houston, Texas, my hometown, stands a 61-foot-tall mural featuring six of the many female trailblazers of the city. The mural is titled “Faces of Change: Her Story is Houston’s Story” and benefits The Women’s Home.
The women featured on the mural include renowned restaurateur Ninfa Laurenzo (I could absolutely go for a bowl of Sopa Azteca right now…), philanthropist Ima Hogg, environmental conservationist Terry Hershey, Dominique de Menil, the art collector who made art more publicly accessible, and Charlotte Baldwin Allen, who helped fund the city’s earliest acquisition and is considered the “Mother of Houston.”
However, in time for election season, one face and story stood out to me the most. Lawmaker and professor Barbara Jordan is depicted in the bottom row in the center, donning a short afro and a smile. With a sharp tongue and an unwavering belief in our Constitution when it mattered most, this Texas trailblazer has had an undeniable effect on the worlds of state, regional, and national politics.
Personal Biography
In the Third Ward of segregated Houston, Barbara Charline Jordan was born to Benjamin M. Jordan and Arlyne Patten Jordan in 1936. With the help of her parents, she excelled in school and went on to shine in speech and debate, graduating magna cum laude from Texas Southern University, a historically Black university in the heart of Houston, in 1956 before pursuing her law degree from Boston University in 1959.
Early career
Initially wanting to work in Massachusetts after being admitted to the bar both there and in Texas, she was inspired to enter the world of politics when volunteering for John F. Kennedy and then-Texas state senator Lyndon B. Johnson in 1960, assisting in the Get Out the Vote program in the African-American precincts of Houston.
Her road to state and national recognition was naturally not easy. However, after two unsuccessful runs in the 1962 and 1964 Texas House of Representatives races, dignity and determination would triumph.
A woman of many firsts
In 1966, Jordan became the first Texas state senator since 1883 and immediately got to work on issues regarding immigrants and the working class. In 1972, she was elected president pro tempore of the Texas Senate and filled the ceremonial role of governor that same year, making her the first Black woman to hold either role in the entire country. Two historic firsts to your name is never enough; she went on to be the first Black woman to deliver a keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in 1976.
Watergate
“My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total.”
Jordan is most notable for her impactful words during President Richard Nixon’s Watergate impeachment trial in 1974. As a freshman member of Congress, as well as one of two African-Americans in the House, she filled two coveted seats: the House Judiciary Committee and the 9 p.m. primetime spot on the second day of the hearings, thanks to Lyndon B. Johnson.
In her remarks, she approached the Constitution from the perspective of her identity, ultimately declaring her faith and the rule of law as the very thing that protects us from inequality or corruption, with the help of “the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision.”
Voting
In a state as notorious for voter suppression as Texas, the late congresswoman fiercely advocated for enforcing the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and dismantling systematic discrimination among minority voters.
Jordan’s outlook on the Constitution is one that I find absolutely noble. While our founders did not have her in mind, our written liberties anchor us to the opportunity to create a better reality through ups and downs. Personally, I cannot wait to vote during this midterm election to honor the pioneering women of our past, present, and future.