Here’s how Jimmy Carter boosted Black women in politics

Photo: Getty Images Former President Jimmy Carter is being remembered for his contributions to the political careers of several Black women amid his death. On Sunday (December 29), news broke that Carter died at age 100 surrounded by his family at his home in Plains, Georgia. Carter was the oldest living president and his state funeral is scheduled for January 9. During his political career, Carter catapulted several Black women in politics amid the wave of feminist and gender activism following the Civil Rights Movement, NBC News reports. Carter, who defeated incumbent Gerald Ford in the 1976 presidential election, picked Alexis M. Herman to serve as the director of the Labor Department’s Women’s Bureau, which was established in 1920. Herman said she initially met Carter while working on an experimental project to create a minority women’s employment program in Atlanta. She also served as a volunteer on the congressional campaign for civil rights leader Andrew Young, who introduced her to Carter. “He was governor of Georgia then, and I was just a few years out of college,” Herman, an Alabama native and Xavier University alumna, said. After being picked to serve in Carter’s administration, Herman returned to the department during...