Shaping History: CAWP Through the Years

Justice Lorna Lockwood, the first woman elected to the Arizona Supreme Court, became the first woman in the U.S. to serve as chief justice of a state supreme court. 

Lelia Foley-Davis was elected mayor of Taft, Oklahoma. She was widely cited in national news reports at the time as the nation's first elected Black woman mayor. While she is not technically the first (see the 1971 timeline entry on Ellen Walker Craig-Jones), she is one of the very first Black women to serve as mayor of a municipality in the country and the first Black woman to serve as mayor of an all-Black town.

Yvonne Brathwaite Burke (D-CA) became the first woman to give birth while serving in Congress. Her daughter, Autumn Burke, went on to be elected to the California State Assembly in 2014. 

Doris A. Davis was elected mayor of the City of Compton, California, making her the first Black woman mayor of a metropolitan city in the United States.

March Fong Eu (D) was elected California's secretary of state, the first Asian American/Pacific Islander to hold a statewide elected executive office.

Kathy Kozachenko became the first openly gay or lesbian candidate to run successfully for political office in the United States, winning a seat on the Ann Arbor, Michigan city council. 

Elaine Noble (D) became the first openly lesbian or gay candidate elected to a state legislature. She served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives for two terms starting in January 1975. 

Julia Cooper Mack was appointed by President Gerald Ford to the DC Court of Appeals, becoming the first Black woman appointed to a court of last resort in the U.S.

Mary Rose Oakar (D-OH) became the first Arab American woman elected to Congress. 

Congresswoman Lindy Boggs (D-LA) served as chairwoman of the 1976 Democratic National Convention, becoming the first woman to preside over a major party convention. Boggs was also the first woman elected to Congress from Louisiana and later served as United States Ambassador to the Holy See. 

Patricia Roberts Harris was appointed by President Jimmy Carter to serve as secretary of Housing and Urban Development during 1977-1979. From 1979-1981, she served as secretary of Health and Human Services. She was the first Black woman to serve in a presidential Cabinet and the first woman to hold two different Cabinet positions.

Nancy Landon Kassebaum (R-KS) was the first woman to have been elected to the Senate without having previously filled an unexpired Congressional term.

Velvalea "Vel" Phillips (D) was elected Wisconsin's secretary of state, the first Black woman to hold a statewide elected executive office.

Eunice Sato was the first Asian American woman to serve as mayor of a major American city. She was mayor of Long Beach, CA, from 1980-1982. 

LaDonna Harris appears to be the first Native American woman nominee for vice president in the United States. She ran on the Citizens Party ticket, which received less than one percent of the popular vote in the 1980 presidential election.

Sandra Day O'Connor, a former Republican state legislator from Arizona who had served on a state appeals court, was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as the first woman ever to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Vesta Roy (R-NH) became the first woman to hold the position of president of a state senate.

Arlene Violet (R-RI), a former nun, became the first woman elected as a state's attorney general, serving from 1985-87.

Sonia Johnson ran on the U.S. Citizens Party ticket, Pennsylvania's Consumer Party ticket, and California's Peace and Freedom Party ticket, becoming the first third-party candidate for U.S. president eligible for federal primary matching funds. 

Congresswoman Lynn Morley Martin (R-IL) began her first of two terms as vice chair of the Republican Conference in the House, the first time a woman held an elected position in the congressional party caucus' hierarchy.

Madeleine Kunin, a Democrat, was elected governor of Vermont. She became the first woman in any state to serve three terms as governor (1985-1991).

Barbara Ann Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat, became the first Democratic woman elected to the Senate without previously filling an unexpired Congressional term. 

Congresswoman Patricia Schroeder (D-CO) made national headlines when she took preliminary steps toward making a run for the presidency, but she dropped out before the primaries, unable to raise the necessary funds.

Lottie Shackleford was elected mayor of Little Rock, Arkansas, the first Black woman elected mayor of one of the 100 largest cities in the United States.

Kay Orr, a Republican from Nebraska, was the first Republican woman elected governor of a state, as well as the first woman to defeat another woman in a gubernatorial race.

Rep. Mary Rose Oakar (D-OH) became the first woman to serve as vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus. 

Lenora Fulani ran for U.S. President twice, first in 1988 and again in 1992, and qualified for federal matching funds as a candidate for the New Alliance Party. 

Representative Barbara Kennelly (D-CT) became the first woman to hold the position of House Democratic chief deputy whip.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida Republican, became the first Hispanic woman and first Cuban American to be elected to Congress. She was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in August 1989 in a special election.

Joan Finney, a Kansas Democrat, became the first woman in any state to defeat an incumbent governor. She served as governor from 1991-1995.

Apart from single-member House delegations, the first all-woman U.S. House delegation was from Hawaii. Representatives Patricia Saiki (R) and Patsy Mink (D) served from 1990 to 1991. They were also the first all-woman of color House delegation.

Sandy Garrett (D) was elected Oklahoma's superintendent of public instruction, making her the first Native American woman to be elected to any statewide executive office in the U.S.

Carol Moseley Braun, an Illinois Democrat, became the first Black woman and the first woman of color to be elected to the U.S. Senate. She had also been the first Black woman to win a major party Senate nomination. She defeated the incumbent in the primary and won the resulting open seat in the general election. Her term ended in 1999 when she lost her re-election bid.

Janet Reno became the first woman to serve as U.S. attorney general. She served in President Bill Clinton's Cabinet from 1993 to 2001. She ran unsuccessfully for governor in the 2002 Florida Democratic primary.

Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) became the first woman to hold the position of secretary to the Senate Democratic Conference in the 104th Congress (1995-1997).

Senator Nancy Landon Kassebaum (R-KS) became the first woman to chair a major Senate committee, the Committee on Labor and Human Resources.

Madeleine K. Albright became the first woman to serve as U.S. secretary of state, serving from 1997 to 2001. She became the highest-ranking woman in the U.S. government, but, as a naturalized citizen, she would not have been eligible to become president. She had previously served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 1993 to 1997.

Aida Alvarez became the first Hispanic women, as well as the first person of Puerto Rican heritage, to hold a Cabinet-level position when she was appointed administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration in the Clinton administration.

Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat from Wisconsin, became the first openly gay or lesbian person elected to Congress as a non-incumbent. She was also Wisconsin's first woman in Congress. In 2012, she became the first openly gay or lesbian person elected to the U.S. Senate. 

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) became the first woman to serve as secretary of the Senate Republican Conference. 

Hillary Rodham Clinton became the only first lady ever elected to public office. She was elected to the U.S. Senate, winning an open seat in a general election. She was also the first woman elected to the Senate from New York.

Gale Norton became the first woman to serve as secretary of the interior, appointed by President George W. Bush. Norton was the first woman elected as Colorado's attorney general and served that position for two terms.

Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) became the first woman to serve as chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Ann Veneman (R) was appointed by President George W. Bush to be the first female secretary of agriculture. She had previously been the first woman to serve as secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture.

Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) was elected by her colleagues as House Democratic whip, at that time the highest-ranking woman in the history of the U.S. Congress.

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) became the first woman to serve as vice chair of the Senate Republican Conference.

Condoleezza Rice became the first woman to hold the post of national security advisor (formally known as assistant to the president for national security affairs) when she was appointed by President George W. Bush.

Representative Nita Lowey (D-NY) became the first woman to chair the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. She also served as House Minority whip-at-large.

Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) became the first woman to head her party in Congress when she was elected by her colleagues as House Democratic leader.

The election to Congress of Linda Sanchez (D-CA) meant that for the first time, two sisters served together in the House. Representative Loretta Sanchez (D-CA) was first elected to the House in 1996.

Condoleezza Rice became the first Republican woman and the first Black woman to serve as U.S. secretary of state.

Three congresswomen became the first women of color to chair congressional committees: Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-OH), Committee on Ethics; Representative Juanita Millender-McDonald (D-CA), Committee on House Administration; and Representative Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), Committee on Small Business.

Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) became the first woman to serve as speaker of the U.S. House.

Colleen Hanabusa (D) became president of the Hawaii Senate, the first woman of color and the first Asian American/Pacific Islander woman woman to hold the top leadership position in a state legislative chamber.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) was the first woman to win a major party's presidential primary for the purposes of delegate selection when she won the primary in New Hampshire on January 8. She also became the first woman to be a presidential candidate in every primary and caucus in every state.

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, selected by Senator John McCain as his vice presidential running mate, became the first woman on a national GOP ticket.

Karen Bass (D) became speaker of the California State Assembly, the first woman of color to serve as speaker of a state house and the first Black woman to lead either house of a state legislature.

Sonia Sotomayor was appointed as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court by President Barack Obama, becoming the first Hispanic and third female member of the Court. Sotomayor had previously been appointed to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by President George H. W. Bush in 1991 and to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit by President Bill Clinton.

Janet Napolitano, governor of Arizona, was appointed secretary of homeland security by President Barack Obama, the first woman to hold that post since the Department of Homeland Security was created in 2003.

Two women of color, both Republicans elected in November 2010, took office as governors, the first women of color chief executives in the country. Susana Martinez, a Latina, became governor of New Mexico, and Nikki Haley, an Asian American, became governor of South Carolina.

U.S. Representative Michele Bachmann (R-MN) campaigned for the Republican nomination for president. She withdrew from the race after a disappointing showing in the Iowa caucuses.

Mazie Hirono (D-HI) became the first Asian American/Pacific Islander woman — and only the second woman of color — elected to the U.S. Senate.

Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) became the first openly bisexual person elected to Congress. In 2018, she became the first openly bisexual person elected to the U.S. Senate. 

Tina Kotek (D-OR) became the country's first openly lesbian state House speaker. 

Ivy Taylor was elected mayor of San Antonio in a special election by her peers on the city council to fill a vacancy, becoming the first Black woman and first woman of color to serve as mayor of one of the nation's ten largest cities. She was re-elected in a regular election in 2015 and served until 2017. 

Maura Healey (D) was elected Massachusetts attorney general, becoming the first openly gay state attorney general elected in the United States as well as the first openly gay woman to be elected to any statewide office in the country. 

Mia Love (R-UT) became the first Black Republican woman in Congress.

Kate Brown (D-OR) became the nation's first openly bisexual governor and the first person to be openly LGBT at the time of assuming the governor's office. 

Loretta Lynch became the first Black woman and the second woman to serve as U.S. attorney general. Appointed by President Barack Obama, she served from 2015-2017.

In June 2016, Hillary Rodham Clinton became the first woman to be a major party's presumptive nominee for president. She formally became the first woman to be a major party's presidential nominee at the Democratic National Convention on July 26, 2016. Despite winning the popular vote by almost 3 million votes, Clinton lost the Electoral College and conceded the general election on November 9, 2016.

Carly Fiorina (R) was a candidate for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, the only woman among the GOP candidates. She suspended her campaign in February 2016 due to disappointing early primary results. In April 2016, Ted Cruz named her as his vice presidential running mate, but he suspended his campaign a week later.

Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) became the first Latina elected to the U.S. Senate.

Kamala Harris (D-CA), who is both Black and South Asian, became the first South Asian and second Black woman elected to the U.S. Senate.

Twenty-five years after Althea Garrison's election and non-consensual outing, Danica Roem (D-VA) became the first openly transgender person to be elected and to serve in a state legislature in the United States. 

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) became the first woman to serve as vice chair of the Senate Democratic Conference. 

Michele Lujan Grisham (NM) was elected governor of New Mexico, becoming the first Democratic woman of color governor nationwide.

Sharice Davids (D-KS) and Deb Haaland (D-NM) became the first Native American women elected to Congress.

Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) became the first Muslim women elected to Congress.

In August 2020, U.S. Senator Kamala Harris was selected by former Vice President Joe Biden as his running mate in the 2020 presidential election. Harris is the first woman of color to be selected as the running mate on a major-party ticket, as well as the first multiracial woman, the first South Asian woman, and the first Black woman. Harris joins Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin in becoming the third woman in history tapped as the vice presidential pick, as well as the fourth woman, with Hillary Clinton, on a major-party presidential ticket.

In November 2020, U.S. Senator Kamala Harris was elected vice president of the United States, becoming the first woman, the first woman of color, the first Black woman, and the first South Asian woman elected to this office. 

Deb Haaland was appointed by President Joe Biden to serve as secretary of the interior, becoming the first Native American woman to serve in a presidential Cabinet.  

Rachel Levine, appointed by President Joe Biden to serve as assistant secretary for health, became the first openly transgender person to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, making her the highest-ranking openly transgender official in U.S. history. 

In August 2024, Vice President Kamala Harris became the second woman, first Black woman, and first South Asian person to be a major party's presidential nominee when she earned the requisite votes of the Democratic National Committee on August 6, 2024. Harris became the nominee after incumbent President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, dropped his bid for re-election and endorsed Harris on July 21, 2024.