Barbara Anita Blackmon (nee Martin, born December 7, 1955)[1] is an American lawyer and politician who served in the Mississippi State Senate, representing the 21st district from 1992 to 2004 and from 2016 to 2024.
[6][5] During her childhood, Martin and her siblings would spend their summers on their grandparents' farm near Utica, Mississippi, where they "spent a lot of time pruning, picking, planting, everything".
Martin spent the next year living alone in "a tiny apartment" in Midtown Manhattan and working in the tax department of the pharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers.
[5] She later noted that her success in New York City away from friends and family gave her the confidence that she had the ability to succeed anywhere.
[5] In 1983, she moved back to Mississippi, where she started a tax practice within the Banks & Nichols law firm.
[10] She won a special election, held on March 10, 1992, to replace District 20 Senator Bob Montgomery, who had resigned to "settle an ethics dispute".
[5] Blackmon won the election due to her own vigorous campaigning in majority-black Canton and rural northern Madison County, and door-to-door campaigning in majority-white southern Madison County, in which she answered questions and concerns of white voters.
[11] Also living in the district was farmer and merchant Ollie Mohamed, a 67-year-old, 21-year Senate member and its incumbent president pro tempore.
[14][10] Cartwright called the election "a far cry from honest" and said that improper tactics were used in Yazoo polling locations.
She was, also, appointed by Lieutenant Governor Eddie Briggs to serve on the powerful Legislative Budget Committee.
[13] She had endorsed Republican incumbent Eddie Briggs in the election for Lieutenant Governor; Briggs lost, and Blackmon lost her favored position as Vice Chairman of the Finance Committee, as the new lieutenant governor (in charge of assigning senators to committees) wanted the tax bill passed.
[19] The bill was opposed by only three Democrats: Willie Simmons, Robert Johnson, and Blackmon (all also supporters of Briggs in the 1995 election).
[9] She was also a member of other committees: Constitution; Finance; Highways & Transportation; Judiciary; and Public Health & Welfare.
In order to open up the redistricting process to the public, Blackmon proposed identical $250,000 amendments of budget bills of different agencies, including the Department of Transportation and the Department of Archives and History, that would give the general public access to state data and computers so individual citizens could create their own plans for redistricting.
[23] In the 2003 session, Blackmon announced that she was not running for re-election to the Senate in order to seek a different elective office.
[25] In late June, her candidacy was endorsed by labor union Mississippi Alliance of State Employees (MASE) (affiliated with the Communication Workers of America).
[25] On August 5, 2003, Blackmon faced former state Supreme Court justice Jim Roberts and Greenwood businessman Troy Brown in the Democratic primary.
[32] On Martin Luther King Jr. Day of that year, Blackmon criticized the state's incumbent governor, Republican Haley Barbour, for his Cabinet appointments; out of 12 spots, all officials were male and all but two were white.
[34] On August 4, 2015, she competed against two-term incumbent Kenneth Wayne Jones (also of Canton) in the Democratic primary.
[36] As no Republicans were running in the district, Blackmon's primary victory was tantamount to the election, and she took office in January 2016.
[37] In 2019, Blackmon ran unopposed in both the Democratic primary and general election and was re-elected to represent the 21st district for the 2020-2024 term.
[38] Since 1986, she has been married to state representative Edward Blackmon Jr.[8] One of their sons, Bradford (born 1988) has been elected to the 2024 Mississippi Legislature to take his mother's seat.