dmired by many American people, she proudly sat in Congress. She publicly opposed the Vietnam War, supported abortion and Equal Rights Amendment (Gitenstein 257). Her election to Congress was a success. She had fought a long battle for all women. With her strength and determination she achieved her goal. She even went so far as to run for President, but unfortunately was not elected. It would have been interesting to have experienced such a powerful woman in the presidency. She might have had the opportunity to further her contributions to the women's movement and to healthcare if elected. One of Shirley's accomplishments was her involvement in the legislation. She supported bills that funded Negroes and Puerto Rican to go to college. She felt that many of the schools were discriminating against minorities. Also they were not given the same opportunities as white children. A program named SEEK which stands for Search for Education, Elevation and Knowledge was one of the bills supported by Shirley to help minorities expand their education beyond high school (Metcalf 121). This bill was one of many bills that she supported while in Congress. A controversial topic that Shirley was involved with was the abortion issue. Many people opposed the idea to legalize abortion, especially religious institutions. However she made a difficult decision to be an advocate for family planning and the right to choose abortion. She addressed the subcommittee on Health of the Senate Labor about her beliefs on abortion and her reasons why it should be legal (Metcalf 139). She was concerned with the welfare of women having illegal abortions or burdened with having an unwanted child. So many women were turned away from medical clinics and went to illegal measures to abort the child (Chisholm 120). Even though the illegal abortion procedures were unhealthy and unclean, women were risking their lives to get rid of their unwanted pregnancies. ...
