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| Barbara Jordan with the House Judiciary Committee |
Jordan, one of the first African American women in Congress, began her speech by establishing her identity as a citizen of the United States. Jordan spoke on July 25, 1974, during the impeachment hearings of the House Judiciary Committee. The committee was reviewing evidence that President Richard Nixon had, among other offenses, committed obstruction of justice during his re-election campaign—a felony under federal law. As the evidence became overwhelming, Nixon eventually resigned in disgrace to avoid certain removal from office.
The issue with which Jordan began was, who is included in the Constitution’s phrase, “we the people?” Who belongs to “the people” of the United States? Yet, today, United States citizens still ask who counts as “we the people. “The answer should be obvious. Unfortunately, it is not always obvious.
To understand Jordan’s answer, the Constitution of the United States expresses a value: government arises from the people. The right to govern does not come from aristocrats or the rich and powerful, but from the people themselves. Sadly, however, our nation has always struggled to ask, “who are the people?” Do Black people count as people? Japanese Americans? Mexican Americans? Native Americans? Immigrants?
By the Constitution’s stated values, Jordan should have been included all along among “we, the people.” Sadly, we all know otherwise.
So, Jordan began by quoting the Preamble:
“Earlier today, we heard the beginning of the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States: ‘We, the people.’ It’s a very eloquent beginning. But when that document was completed on the seventeenth of September in 1787, I was not included in that ‘We, the people.’ I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in ‘We, the people.’”Jordan’s wry humor—“just left me out by mistake”—reminded everyone how easily values and practice can function separately. She reminded the committee, in fact, reminded the nation, of the long struggle for freedom. All the same, on that day in 1974, Jordan (who was once omitted from “we, the people”) now sat in judgment of the nation’s wayward president. She supported the Constitution that once excluded her. She spoke against any assault against the Constitution’s protections:
“Today I am an inquisitor. An hyperbole would not be fictional and would not overstate the solemnness that I feel right now. My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. And I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction, of the Constitution.”Thus, Jordan established her credibility, her bona fides, to investigate the conduct of the President of the United States.
As rhetorical theorist Kenneth Burke points out, our sense of identity, the question of who and what we identify ourselves with, underlies all persuasion. Jordan's stark humor and statement of utter loyalty establish, first and foremost, her identification. She was one of “we, the people,” fully committed to the Constitution, and ready to investigate and pass judgment on a president who threatened constitutional government.
Jordan then recited Nixon’s crimes, his offenses against constitutional government. What mattered most, however, is that she began by defining who she, Barbara Jordan, was. Her question, however, remains: do we still include everyone in “we, the people?”
by William D. Harpine
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Copyright © 2024, William D. Harpine
Image: U. S. House of Representatives, via Wikimedia Commons
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