Barbara C. Jordan Timeline

February 21, 1936 Born Barbara Charline Jordan in Houston Texas to Rev. Benjamin M. Jordan and Arlyne (Patten) Jordan

1956 Graduated magna cum laude from Texas Southern University

1959 Graduated from Boston University Law School

1959 Taught political science at Tuskegee Institute

1960 Worked on the Kennedy-Johnson campaign

1962, 1964 Ran unsuccessfully for election to the Texas House of Delegates

1966 Elected to the Texas Senate becoming the first African American state senator since 1883

March 21, 1967 Became the first Black elected official to preside over the Texas Senate. She was the first Black state senator to chair a major committee, Labor and Management Relations, and the first freshman senator ever named to the Texas Legislative Council.

March 1972 Became the first African-American female to serve as president pro tem of the state senate

June 1972 Served for one day as acting governor of Texas

1972 Elected to the United States House of Representatives for Houston’s 18th district, becoming the first black woman from a Southern state to serve in the House.

1974 Made the historic speech before the House Judiciary Committee supporting the impeachment of President Richard Nixon.

1976 Made the historic keynote address at the Democratic National Convention

1976 Sponsored legislation to broaden the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to cover Mexican Americans in Texas and other southwestern states and to extend its authority to those states where minorities had been denied the right to vote or had had their rights restricted by unfair registration practices, such as literacy tests.

1977 Sponsored the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, legislation that required banks to lend and make services available to underserved poor and minority communities.

1979 Retired from politics in 1979 and became a professor at the University of Texas at Austin Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs.

1992 She again was a keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention.

1995 Chaired a congressional commission that advocated increased restriction of immigration and increased penalties on employers that violated US immigration regulations

1995 Awarded the prestigious United States Military Academy’s Sylvanus Thayer Award.

January 17, 1996 Died