In the fabric of what memory is left in my head from the late '60s / early '70s, Shirley Chisholm will always and forever be stitched together with both the civil rights and women's equality movements that gained steam during those heady times. In a manner of speaking, Ms. Chisholm was one part Rosa Parks, one part Gloria Steinem, and one part Angela Davis - though I doubt she'd want to be remembered exactly that way.
Shirley Chisholm died yesterday at the age of 80.
What was remarkable to me, as a young caucasian guy in the Nixonian early 1970's, was that a black woman - yes, a black woman - had the audacity to step into a white man's exclusive domain, and kick up some significant dust in a run at the presidency. We're not about talking a Carol Moseley-Braun token / protest run - we're talking about a full fledged, grassroots campaign that eventually gathered Ms. Chisholm 152 delegates to the Democratic National Convention in 1972.
Think about that for a moment.
At a time when Nixon's popularity was running very high (despite the looming Watergate scandal), "4 Dead in O-HI-O" was still in rotation on AM Top 40 radio stations, and the war in Vietnam was wheezing along on its last legs, an uppity negro woman from the Bedford-Stuy neighborhood of New York City gathered more momentum during the Democratic primaries than did John Edwards in 2004.
Above all, I remember Ms. Chisholm as having a keen sense of what was right, not what was black or white or brown or male or female. Pre-CSPAN, she was the outsider's insider, and truly the personification of LBJ's "Great Society". Her life's efforts went way beyond merely demolishing barriers (which is no doubt how she'll be eulogized in the coming days); her efforts provided entry to an exclusive club for an entire class of people underserved by their government.
Suffice it to say that the time in history during which Chisholm served in the House of Representatives coincided neatly with the formation of my own political compass.
Here's a link to a report on Shirley Chisholm's passing. If you're not terribly familiar with her story, I think you'll be surprised at some of the things she accomplished, and her political adroitness at getting what she wanted. Most importantly, she pressed for what she wanted for the right reasons.
I don't think you'll recognize many of the current Capitol Hill gang of thieves in the legacy of true public service that Ms. Chisholm leaves. In fact, I know you won't. Not one of them has her cast-iron force of will that was driven by a divinely inspired righteousness of cause.
