Cynthia DeLores Nottage, who would later become famous as C. DeLores Tucker, never let being one of the youngest in her family overwhelm her, writes Avi Wolfman-Arent for Billy Penn at WHYY.
At a young age, she never hesitated to make her voice heard, eventually beginning a career as an activist and politician.
In 1968, she was appointed as the first Black person to serve on the Philadelphia Zoning Board of Adjustment and in 1971, was appointed Secretary of the Commonwealth, making her the first Black woman in Pennsylvania history to hold a cabinet position.
Voting rights and access were among her biggest sweet spots.
As secretary, she helped lower the voting age in Pennsylvania to 18 and promoted mail-based voter registration in the Commonwealth.
This was especially important to help move the needles of racial justice, as it was her belief that money and votes were the two biggest power brokers of America.
“We don’t all have equal bucks, but we all have equal ballots,” Tucker once told the Inquirer in 1971.
After getting fired as secretary in 1977, she never rose higher in state politics, but continued making moves in the political scene, becoming chair of the Democratic National Convention’s Black Caucus and later co-founder of the National Congress of Black Women.
Learn more about C. DeLores Tucker’s legacy at Billy Penn at WHYY.
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C. DeLores Tucker was a notable civil rights activist.
