Barbara Jordan: Speaking the Truth with Eloquent Thunder ed. by Max Sherman (review)

questions about the intelligence he received from military and civilian intelligence sources. Bullion pays special attention to LBJ’s understanding of power. He raises this issue in the introduction and then comes back to it repeatedly throughout the book. Without comprehending LBJ’s definition of power, no one can begin to know how LBJ operated both at home and abroad. For Johnson, power existed to be utilized to benefit people. Those who understood the uses and limitations of power were, according to Johnson, the ones who deserved to wield it. Bullion explains that Johnson became frustrated with those who did not recognize this, and became confused when some groups began to question the means by which he accomplished his goals. The president, Bullion emphasizes, equated power with results and did not care about the means he had to use to reach his goal. Bullion also continually returns to the theme of the connections between, as he puts it in the introduction, “the power [LBJ] amassed and the limitations under which he used it” (p. 7). No student of this time period can afford to ignore the reality of the restrictions on America’s, the president’s, and the general public’s ability to accomplish their aims. Obviously, since the book is so brief, some aspects of the president’s story get short shrift. For example, his early life is relegated to nine pages. Some might argue that those formative years deserve better treatment. Others might be appalled by the cursory treatment of LBJ’s Senate years, which merit a mere twenty pages. Others might wish there had been more context throughout the entire work. Despite such criticisms, most teachers will find this a very satisfying book for their students. In particular, they will be pleased by Bullion’s habit of emphasizing the broader significance of some of LBJ’s decisions. To emphasize some of these points, a set of discussion questions is included in the back of the book. Texas State University–San Marcos Mary Brennan Barbara Jordan: Speaking the Truth with Eloquent Thunder. Edited by Max Sherman. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2007. Pp. 126. Illustrations, notes, DVD. ISBN 978-0-29271-637-7. $19.95, cloth.) Edited by Max Sherman, this volume compiles several speeches that exemplify the character and political nature of the late Barbara Jordan. Unlike previous studies and literary works that addressed “who was Barbara Jordan,” this small book that includes nine speeches delivered by Barbara Jordan, is an intellectual presentation of “who is Barbara Jordan” (p. xi). Max Sherman, former Texas Senate colleague to Barbara Jordan, opens the collection with what he identifies as “a must read” for readers of this volume. The Commencement Speech at Howard University, May 11, 1974, which was delivered to university graduates by Barbara Jordan approximately sixteen months after she was sworn in as the first African-American woman from the South to be elected to the United States Congress, sets the tone for the book. At the end of the speech, Jordan asked—no, demanded—that the graduates “affirm the civil liber2009 Book Reviews 353 *jan 09 11/26/08 12:00 PM Page 353 ties of the people of this country” (p. 19). This charge by the former Texas senator and United States congresswoman exemplified what many followers of Jordan now understand as her intrinsic principle—her faith in the “Constitution as whole.” Agreeably, readers will find that this speech is best embraced when heard on the accompanying DVD. The audio presentation, by Anna Deveare Smith, actress, writer, playwright, passionately delivers the tenor of Jordan’s unwavering commitment to civil liberties. In the section “The National Political Stage,” Sherman captures Barbara Jordan’s position on constitutional literalism and party politics. Jordan mesmerized , antagonized, and informed not only her congressional colleagues, but the American viewing public in her eleven minutes of remarks about the constitutional basis for impeachment, U.S. House Judiciary Committee Impeachment Hearings, July 25, 1974. The unforgettable phrase, “my faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total,” depicted Jordan’s literalist conviction in the intent of the Constitution as one that should not be fluid and changing, especially in the case...