Jelani Cobb
In January, 1972, Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress, appeared at a Baptist church in Brooklyn and announced her candidacy for President of the United States. Chisholm was a singular force in American politics of the time: her support for civil rights and legal abortion made her a pivotal connection between the interests of African Americans and the emerging, mostly white, reproductive-rights movement. But, despite her status as a trailblazer, her campaign—set against an entirely white, entirely male field of rivals for the Democratic Party’s nomination—was more often than not treated as a lark. The newly formed Congressional Black Caucus, of which she was a founder, did not endorse her. (Many members chose to support George McGovern, the eventual nominee.) The political calculations were clear: the nation would not support a Black woman, and the better play was to back a viable candidate who might eventually provide a return on the investment.
Fifty-two years later, Kamala Harris’s ascent to being the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party represents, on many levels, a sharp contrast to Chisholm’s story. (Harris, during her 2020 Presidential run, nodded to her predecessor’s significance by incorporating a color scheme and typography similar to Chisholm’s 1972 campaign materials into her own.) Chisholm waged a shoestring effort, using her own savings to keep her campaign afloat; for Harris, word of President Joe Biden’s exit from the race unleashed a torrent of cash to support her candidacy. ActBlue reported a hundred-and-five-million-dollar haul within roughly the first twenty-four hours. The next day, Voto Latino committed to forty-four million. Chisholm essentially had to build her own electorate as she campaigned; Harris’s entry into the Presidential contest sparked a reported seven-hundred-per-cent increase in voter registrations.
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