Norton, Mary Teresa, 1875-1959

Mary Teresa Norton (née Hopkins, March 7, 1875 – August 2, 1959) was an American Democratic Party politician who represented Jersey City and Bayonne in the United States House of Representatives from 1925 to 1951.

Born in Jersey City, New Jersey, she attended parochial schools and Jersey City High School before graduating from Packard Business College, New York City in 1896. She worked as a secretary and stenographer until she married Robert Francis Norton in April 1909. As part of the healing process after her one-week-old son, Robert Jr., died in 1910, Norton began working at the Queen’s Daughters Day Nursery and, within three years, became its secretary. By 1916 she was elected nursery president. In her capacity as a fundraiser for the nursery, Norton made contacts throughout the New Jersey political world. Her husband, who died in 1934, supported her professional and political careers to the end.

After World War I, in search of municipal support for the nursery, Norton met Jersey City’s mayor and powerful political boss, Frank “I Am the Law” Hague. Following the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, Hague pressed Norton to enter politics as his protégé. In 1920, with Hague’s backing, Norton was the first woman named to the New Jersey Democratic Committee and, in 1921, was elected its vice chair, serving in that capacity until 1931. She became the first woman to head a state party when she was elevated to chair in 1932. She served until 1935 and was again named chair from 1940 to 1944.

In 1924, with Hague’s endorsement, Norton ran unopposed in the Democratic primary and won election to the U.S. House of Representatives that November. Throughout her House career, Norton chaired four committees: Labor; District of Columbia; Memorials; and House Administration. She helped pass the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, working with Clara Mortenson Beyer, Frances Perkins, and Mary La Dame as part of what was colloquially called the "Ladies' Brain Trust." Norton was not a candidate for renomination in 1950. She became a "Womanpower Consultant" for the Women's Advisory Committee on Defense Manpower, in the United States Department of Labor from 1951 to 1952. After Congress, Norton moved to Greenwich, Connecticut, to live near her sister. She died there on August 2, 1959.