The Highest Glass Ceiling by Ellen Fitzpatrick

Author:Ellen Fitzpatrick
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2016-01-16T00:00:00+00:00

She made this case forthrightly to her colleagues in the Unity Democratic Club.49

Chisholm immediately faced a flare of opposition within the Unity Democratic Club, from county Democratic party leaders and, as she would soon find out, some voters who objected to a woman—any woman, apparently—seeking elective office. Jones himself didn’t seem entirely enthusiastic about a Chisholm candidacy. From the start, he had wanted men to assume prominent leadership positions in the UDC, in part to provide “male black youth” with a positive “image.” There were inevitably men in the UDC who felt they were more deserving than Chisholm of party backing for the assembly seat. Others in the club disliked Chisholm. Not surprisingly, by 1964 her long career in democratic politics had made her some enemies. In the end, Jones stuck by her. She won the backing of the UDC, and the Kings County Democratic party leaders. Her nomination was, the Amsterdam News reported, “a history making event in the annals of Brooklyn politics.”50

Chisholm soon found that her sex counted on both sides of the ledger sheet—at times as a liability but in other ways as an asset. She was verbally accosted by both men and women who told her: “You ought to be home, not out here.” At the same time, Chisholm could tap into an expansive network of African American women activists who had long been engaged in local politics and community service. She also stood to benefit potentially from the higher number of registered women voters than men in her district—almost 5,000 more in the 17th A.D. “Come on women of Brooklyn,” an African American woman journalist wrote in her syndicated column of Chisholm’s election bid. “We can definitely put her in and many others too. In unity there is strength. We have the numbers.” Chisholm devoted countless hours to voter registration even as she campaigned for the state assembly.51

The candidate’s long years of community activism, much of it in women’s organizations and around issues of children and social services, helped Chisholm. As had been true of Margaret Chase Smith, she benefited tremendously from the indefatigable efforts of club women. As president of the Brooklyn Chapter of the Key Women of America, an African American civic organization, Chisholm was well placed to call out the troops. The Key Women’s hard work and fundraising during the campaign—“we were actually her backbone,” said one club officer—eased Chisholm’s burdens as a candidate. Chisholm could scarcely afford the “mailings, posters, rallies” and a get-out-the-vote operation. The Unity Democratic Club had little money to offer; the county Democratic party “was not about to help us much,” the nominee remembered. Instead, Chisholm drew on her personal savings. She made four trips to the bank during the campaign to withdraw a total of $4,000. “It is not much by modern standards,” she admitted, “but I made it do.” In the end, she won more than 70 percent of the primary vote and sailed to victory by an even larger margin—nearly 90 percent—in the general election.

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