She may not have won the 1972 nomination but she changed U.S. politics forever | Opinion

Black History Month celebrates the remarkable achievements of Black Americans, and it is particularly important to remember Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005). In 1972, the first Black congresswoman became the first Black person to run for President on a major-party ticket, and the first woman to run on the Democratic ticket. Chisholm’s presidential campaign was an attempt to win that acknowledged the impossibility of winning.

“Presidential Politics is a big-time, high-stakes game, and it is played by tough, sophisticated politicians with plenty of money and plenty of skill,” she wrote in her second book, The Good Fight. “My own participation in 1971 and 1972 was a unique, one-shot phenomenon, an effort by an amateur supported by a crowd of idealists.” But she simply knew someone had to go first and she felt compelled to do it. She simply felt that she was positioned to run a serious campaign that would “open up the doors” for Black candidates and women to seek the office in the future. “That was it. I wasn’t even thinking what would happen if I got it… I really didn’t think about these things at all. All that was on my mind was that I had to do it. I had to open the door ajar.” She campaigned in Florida, California, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Minnesota, Colorado, and North Carolina, and appeared on the ballot in a dozen other states.

The idea was to bring a substantial bloc of delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Miami so as to be in a negotiating position. She had no illusion that she would actually win the nomination. She was, in fact, ruthlessly pragmatic. No Democratic candidate would be able to beat Nixon, she maintained during and after the campaign, except for Senator Edward Kennedy with Arkansas Rep. Wilbur Mills as running mate. Her analysis rested not on her particular affinity for Kennedy and Mills but on her calculus of what voters would do on election day: vote for a recognized name at the top of the ticket with a southern vice presidential candidate just below. She was determined to see the campaign through the convention, to help turn the convention toward drafting Kennedy if possible; to influence the platform and get promises from the eventual nominee; and to “prove a point” that someone besides a white man could run. She only succeeded at the latter. But in so doing, she violated political protocols that included paying one’s dues and working through established channels. She insisted on following her own script when it came to running her campaign. The result was irritation mixed with grudging admiration from Black and women colleagues and activists as well as concern that she might be able to block nomination of another candidate that might win loyalty from Black and women delegates otherwise.

Far from seeing her catholic relationships with the Black freedom struggle and women’s movement as liabilities, Chisholm’s Black feminist vision of political power made her think she was uniquely suited to build a strong coalition. She envisioned a campaign organization and voter base of people who were Black, female, young, poor, or all four. By introducing racial and gender equality simultaneously, through the symbol of her own person, she thought that she could build a voluminous tent that would encompass Americans of all identities. In her dream, those within the tent would recognize each other as allies and come together as a committed electoral coalition that would bring enough clout to the Democratic Party to move the platform and the eventual nominee leftward. She repeatedly called herself the “instrument” through which all constituents had a voice. As it would turn out, the coalition would never come to be, although she would become the first woman and Black American to carry delegates at the Democratic National Convention.

It was irrelevant to Chisholm that her unilateral decision to run annoyed other Black politicians and feminists. She was asserting her right to run, despite her extremely slim chances. And she had an unshakeable amount of confidence in herself and her convictions.

“I ran because someone had to do it first,” she wrote. “In this country everybody is supposed to be able to run for president but that’s never really been true. I ran because most people think the country is not ready for a black candidate, not ready for a woman candidate.” Armed with the courage of her convictions, “I had a mind of my own, you can’t tell me what to do,” Chisholm would say later. In her view, her great strengths were “self-confidence, aggressive, no-nonsense, articulate, [and] decisive.” She added, “I really can’t think of my weaknesses,” though acknowledged that others might criticize her stubbornness and iconoclasm. She conceded that “I had too much confidence at times… maybe at times. I don’t know. I was such a confident person. I was not afraid of anything or anybody.”

Chisholm was able to raise $250,000, most of it from small donations (though total expenses were close to 300,000 and it took three years to pay off remaining debt once the campaign was over). She had been stunned when supporters in Florida and Minnesota, many of them women, raised $10,000 between them within a month. She had challenged their insistence that she run by pointing out that she would need money to do so, and they proceeded to do just that. “When they sent me the money, I was very much… I was very much afraid. It shook me a little bit. Because then if I didn’t run, they’ll have called my bluff and I’d say, oh gosh, what have I gotten myself into? And that’s how it began to grow.” Eventually she would have 16 or 17 satellite offices. Throughout the campaign, supporters were creative in their fundraising. They held chicken fries, fashion shows, and dances. The most that any one group raised was between $4,000 and 5,000, which alarmed Chisholm because she knew much more would be needed. But she said that the enthusiasm and her following kept her going.

Anastasia Curwood is a history professor at the University of Kentucky and director of the Commonwealth Institute for Black Studies. This pieces is an excerpt from her new book, “Shirley Chisholm: Champion of Black Feminist Power Politics.”