Delta Sigma Theta’s Barbara Jordan Became the First Black Woman Elected to Congress from the South

Did you know that the first Black woman elected to Congress from the South was a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.? Her name was Barbara Jordan, and she carried the sorority’s commitment to public service from a historically Black campus in Houston all the way to the halls of Congress.

Barbara Charline Jordan was born on February 21, 1936, in Houston, Texas. She graduated magna cum laude from Texas Southern University, the historically Black university in Houston, in 1956, where she became a star of the school’s celebrated debate team. It was during her time at Texas Southern that she was initiated into Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. through the Delta Gamma Chapter. She went on to earn her law degree from Boston University in 1959 and returned home to Houston to practice.

Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. was founded at Howard University in 1913 by twenty-two collegiate women dedicated to scholarship and public service, and Jordan spent her life living out that mission on the largest stages in American government.

In 1966 she was elected to the Texas Senate, becoming the first Black woman ever elected to that body and the first Black state senator in Texas since 1883. Then, in 1972, she made history again. As the U.S. House of Representatives History, Art & Archives records, Jordan was elected to Congress and took office in 1973, becoming the first Black woman elected to the House from the South.

Jordan’s legacy has been honored across the nation. In 1994, President Bill Clinton awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian honor. Austin-Bergstrom International Airport named its main terminal the Barbara Jordan Terminal in 1999, and in 2011 the U.S. Postal Service honored her with a Black Heritage Forever stamp, unveiled on the campus of her alma mater, Texas Southern University. In 2022, the state of Texas named an office building in Austin in her memory.

From the Delta Gamma Chapter at Texas Southern University to the floor of Congress, Barbara Jordan carried the public service her sorority was founded upon into a life that is still honored today.