1917 Jeannette Rankin First woman to serve in Congress
1920 Women's Suffrage 19th Amendment gives women the right to vote
1931 Hattie Wyatt Caraway First woman elected to the Senate (succeeded her late husband)
1933 Frances Perkins First woman to serve in the Cabinet (Sec. of Labor)
1960 Margaret Chase Smith First woman elected to both the House (1940) and Senate (1960)
1968 Shirley Chisholm First black woman elected to Congress (She then ran for president in 1972)
1977 Patricia Roberts Harris First black woman to serve in the Cabinet (Sec. of HUD)
1978 Nancy Landon Kassebaum First woman elected to the Senate without succeeding her husband
1981 Sandra Day O'Connor First woman to serve as a Supreme Court justice
1983 Elizabeth Dole First woman to serve in two Cabinets over two administrations (Transportation and Labor)
1984 Geraldine Ferraro First woman to run as vice presidential candidate for a major party
1993 Janet Reno First woman to serve as attorney general
1997 Madeleine Albright First woman to serve as secretary of state
2000 Hillary Clinton First former first lady to be a candidate for public office (became U.S. senator)
2001 Elaine Chao First Asian-American woman to serve in the Cabinet (Sec. of Labor)
2005 Condoleezza Rice First black woman to serve as secretary of state
2007 Nancy Pelosi First woman to serve as speaker of the house
2009 Janet Napolitano First woman to serve as secretary of homeland security
Hilda Solis First Latina woman to serve in the Cabinet (Sec. of Labor)
Sonia Sotomayor First Latina woman to serve in the Cabinet (Sec. of Labor)
2016 Hillary Clinton First woman nominated as a presidential candidate for a major political party
Kamala Harris First Indian American and second black woman elected to the Senate
Catherine Cortez Masto First Latina to serve in the Senate