Yvonne Pearl Burke (née Watson, later Brathwaite; born October 5, 1932) is an American politician and lawyer from California.

In 1973, she became the first member of the U.S. Congress to give birth while in office, and she was the first person to be granted maternity leave by the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

[8] Burke is one of the first black women to be admitted to the University of Southern California Law School.

[11] She was the first African American and the first woman of color to hold that position, and presided for about fourteen hours when the chair left the convention on its last day.

[14] In 1979, shortly after she left Congress, Governor Jerry Brown appointed Burke to the Board of Regents of the University of California; but she resigned later that year when Governor Brown appointed her to fill a vacancy in the District 4 seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

[15] After a hard-fought campaign that often turned negative, Burke narrowly defeated State Senator Diane Watson.

On July 27, 2007, the Los Angeles Times published a front-page story revealing that she was not living in the mostly low-income district she represented, but rather in the wealthy Brentwood neighborhood, an apparent violation of state law.

Burke responded that she was living at her Brentwood mansion because the townhouse she listed in official political filings was being remodeled.