Margaret Chase Smith

Maine senator, first woman to serve in both chambers, who confronted McCarthy with her Declaration of Conscience.

Overview

Smith won her late husband's House seat in 1940, moved to the Senate in 1948, and served until 1972, the first woman elected to both chambers. In June 1950 she delivered the Declaration of Conscience, with six colleagues, denouncing character assassination without naming its author, the most prominent Republican rebuke of McCarthy's tactics. She championed the military and space programs and women's service, was the first woman placed in nomination for the presidency by a major party in 1964, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1989.