Barbara Jordan Statue

Barbara Jordan (1936-1996) was an American patriot and role model born and raised in Houston's Fifth Ward by her parents, Benjamin and Arlyne Jordan. She excelled in public schools and graduated magna cum laude from Texas Southern University in 1956 with a degree in history and political science, becoming a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. and helping her debate team tie Harvard that year. With support from her sisters Rose Mary and Bennie, she earned a law degree from Boston University in 1959 and passed the bar exam in both Massachusetts and Texas the same year. Despite what she called society's 'three strikes against her for being poor, black, and a woman,' she achieved many firsts, becoming the first African American woman elected to the Texas Senate, the first African American Texan elected to the United States Congress, and the first African American and first woman to give the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, where she emphasized unity, equality, accountability, and justice. Respected as a masterful politician and effective leader of pragmatic approach and absolute integrity, she received many honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, induction into the National Women's Hall of Fame, appointment as Special Counsel for Ethics by Texas Governor Ann Richards, and 31 honorary doctoral degrees, and in 1993 the National Women's Hall of Fame selected her as one of the most influential women of the twentieth century. As a member of the House Judiciary Committee during the 1974 Watergate Hearings, she declared her complete faith in the Constitution and refusal to be an idle spectator to its diminution, subversion, or destruction, and her students said she carried a copy of it everywhere she went. After retiring from politics, she returned to Austin as Professor and holder of the Lyndon Baines Johnson Centennial Chair in Public Affairs at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. Her legacy endured in the public schools that bear her name, in her devotion to speaking with and inspiring students across the country, and in her emphasis on unity through the phrase she frequently used, 'E Pluribus Unum' - 'From Many, One.' She died on January 17, 1996, was eulogized by President of the United States William Jefferson Clinton and former Texas Governor Ann Richards, and was buried on Republic Hill next to Stephen F. Austin in the Texas State Cemetery as the first African American laid to rest there.

Austin, Texas · United States