Geraldine Ferraro, who died yesterday at 75, cemented her place in US political history in 1984, when she became the first woman (and also the first Italian-American) to be nominated for national office on a major-party ticket
As it turned out, it wasn’t exactly a ticket for Success; Democrat Walter Mondale and his vice-presidential running mate suffered a setback of equally historical proportion at the hands of Ronald Reagan and the Republican Party.
But the nomination certainly expanded the possibilities for women in public life. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s central role in the 2008 presidential campaign speaks to that point — as does the increasingly significant role women are playing in local, state and national politics.
Still, there is a thin line between ticket-balancing and pandering, and the Ferraro nomination clearly crossed it — as the candidate herself ultimately confessed.
“I am the first to admit that were I not a woman, I would not have been the vice-presidential nominee,” she wrote in her memoir.
Indeed, having served less than six years in Congress, she likely wouldn’t have been on anyone’s shortlist otherwise (much as Sarah Palin’s sparse résumé served her improbably well in 2008).
Moreover, Mondale ended up choosing Ferraro only after a high-pressure campaign from feminist leaders, who threatened a convention-floor fight if a woman was not named to the ticket.
It was rough campaign, which — again — ended in a landslide defeat for the Democratic ticket; notwithstanding Ferraro, even 55 percent of women voted against it.
This pretty much ended her political career: She failed in two later attempts to win the Democratic primary for a US Senate seat from New York.
Still, there’s no denying that her nomination permanently shattered the political glass ceiling — to America’s lasting benefit.