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The first African American to become party leader in either chamber of congress was Hakeem Jeffries in 2023. One member, then Senator Barack Obama, went from the Senate to President of the United States in 2009. The first African Americans to serve in the Congress were Republicans elected during the Reconstruction Era.
The first African-American woman to serve as a representative was Shirley Chisholm from New York's 12th congressional district in 1969 during the Civil Rights Movement. Many African-American members of the House of Representatives serve majority-minority districts. [4]
After Congress passed the First Military Reconstruction Act of 1867 and ratified the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1870, African Americans began to be elected or appointed to national, state, county and local offices throughout the United States.
Oscar Stanton De Priest (March 9, 1871 – May 12, 1951) was an American politician and civil rights advocate from Chicago. A member of the Illinois Republican Party, he served as a U.S. Representative from Illinois's 1st congressional district from 1929 to 1935. He was the first African American to be elected to Congress in the 20th century ...
Joseph Hayne Rainey (June 21, 1832 – August 1, 1887) was an American politician. He was the first black person to serve in the United States House of Representatives and the second black person (after Hiram Revels) to serve in the United States Congress.
He was one of the first African Americans in the United States Congress elected during the Reconstruction Era, and the first black person to be elected to Congress from Florida. He also served four terms in the Florida Senate. [1] Twice his election to U.S. Congress was overturned.
Born free in North Carolina, he later lived and worked in Ohio, where he voted before the Civil War. Elected by the Mississippi legislature to the United States Senate as a Republican to represent Mississippi in 1870 and 1871 during the Reconstruction era, he was the first African American to serve in either house of the U.S. Congress.
The first African American to vote in the United States after the passage of the 15th Amendment Thomas Mundy Peterson (October 6, 1824 – February 4, 1904) of Perth Amboy, New Jersey , has been claimed to be the first African American to vote in an election under the just-enacted provisions of the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution .