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Shirley Chisholm “Regan is the president, but I voted for Shirley Chisholm.” --- Biz Markie
Shirley Anita Chisholm earned her place in history as the first Black woman elected to the United States Congress, and also as the first woman- White or Black- to make a serious bid for the presidency. Shirley Chisholm was born on November 30, 1924, in Brooklyn, New York, one of four daughters of Charles and Ruby St. Hill, who both hailed from the West Indies. Her father was an unskilled laborer and her mother a seamstress and domestic, whose primary goal was to see to it that their children received a good education. She attended a Brooklyn girl’s high school and then entered Brooklyn College,
where she earned a B.A. cum laude in 1946, majoring in sociology. She subsequently attended Columbia University where she earned an M.A. degree in elementary education, and she became an authority on early education and child welfare. She also developed an interest in Black history and the issue of civil rights. Harriet Tubman, the fearless Black conductor on the Underground Railroad, and Susan B. Anthony, a suffragette, were among her heroines. Shirley Chisholm became increasingly involved in the community and, anxious to be in a position where she could dramatically forge
change, she entered politics. Directly accountable to the people rather than to so-called party bosses, she campaigned without the blessing of the Democratic Party machine and, she was elected to the New York State Assembly in 1964,
the first Black woman ever elected to the position. During her four years in the statehouse,