Other firsts in state legislatures this year:
- Malcolm Smith, a New York City Democrat, is the first Black elected majority leader in the state Senate. New York's first Black governor, David Paterson, has been in office nearly a year.
- Rhode Island's Senate elected its first female president, M. Teresa Paiva-Weed, a Newport Democrat. "Every young woman should know that anything is possible," she said.
- In North Carolina, Pearl Burris Floyd of Gaston County will take her seat as the first Black Republican woman elected to the House.
- In Nevada, Steven Horsford, D-North Las Vegas, will be its first Black Senate majority leader.
- In Maine, women are both House speaker and Senate president for the first time: Rep. Hannah Pingree, D-North Haven, and Sen. Elizabeth Mitchell, D-Vassalboro.
- In Ohio, state Rep. Armond Budish, a Democrat from the Cleveland suburb of Beachwood, is its first Jewish House Speaker.
- And Obama, of course, will soon become the first African-American President of the United States.
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