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Jesse Jackson is one of the major civil rights leaders of the modern period. His association with Martin Luther King and the leadership of the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) led him to subsequent work in the urban north. Jackson became representative of an economic and class-based approach to race empowerment in the post-Civil Rights era (1968-present). He expanded this profile through his involvement in international affairs and his two high profile presidential campaigns in 1984 and 1988. He also emerged as a critical voice for Black concerns in the 1990’s and throughout the first quarter of the 21st century. He is the most recognizable civil rights leader of his generation and his impact on Black struggle and advancement in the social, political and economic realms is immeasurable.
Born in Greenville, South Carolina to a single mother. Jackson excelled in school and obtained a football scholarship to the University of Illinois. He transferred to North Carolina AT&T where he majored in Political Science. He pursued a Masters of Divinity (MDiv) at the University of Illinois but left school one class short of graduation. He eventually obtained an MDiv from Chicago Theological Seminary in 2000.
Trained in nonviolence, Jackson was deeply concerned influenced by the Civil Rights Movement. Unlike other young activists, Jackson was not influenced by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Rather he worked with the more conservative and ministerially based Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC). Jackson participated in the March from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. He quickly rose in the SCLC’s leadership ranks. He participated in the Chicago campaign in 1966. In 1967, Martin Luther King selected Jackson to run SCLC’s economic arm, Operation Breadbasket in Chicago. Jackson served as national director.
Operation Breadbasket expanded dramatically under Jackson’s leadership. The organization used economic boycotts initiated by black consumers to pressure white businesses to hire Black employees and purchase goods and services from Black owned businesses. Jackson enlisted the help of powerful supporters such as TRM Howard, a Mississippi medical doctor, business owner, hospital owner and proponent of entrepreneurship and economic power among Blacks. Howard introduced Jackson to businesspeople in Chicago. The organization held massive rallies on Saturdays which featured economic and political leaders from the white and Black community.
After Martin Luther King’s assassination in April 1968, a power struggle emerged between Jackson and Ralph Abernathy, King’s chief lieutenant in SCLC. Jackson’s aggressive and flamboyant style clashed with Abernathy’s more reserved and camera-shy persona. Jackson also viewed the struggle for civil rights as an economic and class struggle while Abernathy conceptualized it as a moral struggle. Jackson established alliances with whites and highlighted the need to address economic parity for African Americans. In 1971, Abernathy ordered Jackson to relocate Operation Breadbasket to Atlanta. Jackson refused and his entire staff resigned from SCLC after Abernathy sought to diminish his stature by questioning expenses from the Black Expo, an economic and cultural festival sponsored by Operation Breadbasket in Chicago in 1971, and suspended Jackson as Operation Breadbasket’s director.
After breaking with SCLC, Jackson formed a new organization known as People United to Save Humanity ( PUSH). With TRM Howard as Director of the Finance, Jackson took aggressive steps to expand the African American economic footprint. PUSH staged boycotts of major American corporations including Coca-Cola, Anheuser Busch and CBS, among others. In 1984, Jackson resigned from PUSH to run for the Democratic presidential nomination.
The most significant achievements of Jackson’s career were his presidential campaigns in 1984 and 1988. Rather than view these runs through the lenses of presidential campaigns by focusing on primaries won or delegates obtained, these presidential runs were designed to reimagine the Democratic Party in the face of severe retrenchment of civil and human rights during the Reagan administration ( 1980-1984) and ( 1984-1988). Reagan’s attempts to undermine the gains of the Civil Rights Movement through his anti civil rights, anti-affirmative action and retrenchment of social services programs had a devastating impact on African Americans, minorities, LGBT and POC.
Jackson first run for the presidency occurred against the backdrop of several important events that occurred in 1983. Harold Washington was elected as the first Black mayor of Chicago. The campaign to obtain a federal holiday for Martin Luther King began to gain traction after the release of Stevie Wonder’s “Happy Birthday” followed by a massive rally at the Lincoln Memorial. Ronald Reagan signed the legislation for the King federal holiday in the same year. In 1984, for the first time in history, the Democratic Party nominated Geraldine Ferraro as the first female vice-presidential candidate of any major political party in the United States. Jackson used his campaign not only to test whether a Black candidate could run a national campaign for president, but to also to invigorate the Black electorate. In accomplishing this goal, he enlisted the help of Ronald Walters, Chair of the Political Science Department at Howard University, who was widely regarded as one of the most prominent political scientists of the twentieth century. Walters strategy for running a Black candidate nationally was utilized by Barack Obama in his successful run for the presidency in 2008.
Measured using a yardstick other than traditional political metrics, Jackson’s campaign was extraordinary. In the South, in states like Georgia, Alabama and Florida, Jackson received outsized Black support. In fact, Jackson ‘s campaign increased Black voter turnout. It is also clear that Jackson wanted to increase the influence of Black people in the Democratic Party. He also wanted to introduce items into the Democratic platform to reflect an expansive Democratic agenda, such as banning runoff primaries, decreasing defense spending and banning nuclear weapons. He also embraced constituencies heretofore ignored in democratic politics. One example of a marginalized group Jackson embraced was Arab Americans. James Zogby, a prominent Arab academic and activist on Arab discrimination was asked to join Jackson’s presidential committee. This was the advent of Arab American involvement as a key constituency in the Democratic Party. Arab Americans were able to elect four delegates to the Democratic National Convention. In Dearborn, Michigan there were fewer than 1,000 Arab Americans registered to vote in 1984. By 1988, the Arab delegation consisted of 55 members. Today, there are more than 14,000 Arab Americans registered in Dearborn alone. Arab officeholders hold significant political positions in nine states.
Jackson’s keynote speech at the 1984 convention was significant for his conciliatory tone, but more importantly for its discussion of the Rainbow Coalition. The speech cited the merits of diverse groups, such as Arab Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, youth, disabled, veterans, small farmers, lesbians and gays to join with African Americans and Jewish Americans to promote political empowerment and public policy issues.
In 1988, Jackson launched a second bid for the presidency. He perfected his campaign chant “Run Jesse Run” and “Win Jesse Win.” Jackson’s campaign’s platform included universal health care, higher taxes for the wealthy, reducation of federal deficits, and an increase in social services spending. He also promoted improving American infrastructure. Jackson’s campaign received more than 6.9 million votes and won 11 contests and primaries in Alabama, The District of Columbia, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Puerto Rico and Virginia.
Jackson’s campaign also served as a catalyst for increased Black political leadership in the Democratic party. It laid the groundwork for the careers of Black political operatives in the late twentieth and first quarter of the twenty-first century. Some of these operatives include individuals, such as Donna Brazile, who served as Jackson’s field director in 1984. She later managed Al Gore’s 2000 Presidential campaign, and served as Chair of the DNC. Ron Brown, headed Jackson’s campaign in 1988. Brown later became the Chair of the DNC and served as U.S. Secretary of Commerce in the Clinton administration. Maxine Waters served as campaign chair for Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign. She has enjoyed a long career as a representative in the U.S. House from California. Willie Brown served as the campaign chair for Jackson’s 1988 campaign. He served as Speaker of the California House of Representatives and is a close friend of Kamala Harris. Al Sharpton, worked closely with Jackson in the SCLC and Operation Breadbasket. At age 13 Sharpton served as the youth director the New York branch of Operation Breadbasket. Sharpton founded the National Action Network in 1991. Carolyn Mosley Braun, an Illinois politician, successful 1992 Senate campaign was supported by Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition/PUSH coalition.
In 1992, Jackson hosted a CNN talk show, “Both Sides with Jesse Jackson.” Throughout the 1990s, Jackson continued to play a significant role in Democratic politics. He helped to promote Bill Clinton’s campaigns for the presidency in 1992 and 1996. He opposed Clinton’s impeachment because of the Monica Lewinsky scandal. He also became briefly involved in the 2000 election debacle. Throughout the early twenty-first century, he was a vocal critic of the Bush administration and the sustained war in Iraq and Afghanistan following 911.
Jackson’s views on foreign affairs were an important component of his portfolio. He was widely known as a diplomatic ambassador and as someone who could secure the release of Americans in difficult circumstances and from regimes not friendly to the United States. In 1983, Jackson secured the release of Navy Pilot Robert Goodman, captured by the Syrian government. Jackson traveled to Syria, appealed to Syrian President Hafez al-Assad and Goodman was released. Jackson also secured the release of 22 American prisoners in Cuba in 1984. Similarly, during the Clinton administration, Jackson traveled to Kenya and Belgrade, Yugoslavia. In the latter instance, Jackson, along with Serbian Congressman Rod Blagojevich met with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. Jackson and Blagojevich secured the release of three men who accidentally crossed the Macedonian border. In 2005, Jackson traveled to Venezuela following the remarks by conservative Christian evangelists that Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan leader, be assassinated. Jackson met with Chavez and addressed the Venezuelan Parliament. In addition to his work in Latin America, Jackson was also a strong proponent of Palestinian rights and a close friend of Yasser Arafat, founding Chairmen of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).
Although not an early supporter of Barack Obama, Jackson eventually endorsed Obama for the presidency of the United States in 2008. As Obama's administration progressed, Jackson was often critical of Obama’s lack of a comprehensive agenda to assist African Americans. Calls for an urban agenda became more pronounced after the murder of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown ignited the Black Lives Matter movement (BLM) in 2013. In the 2016 presidential contest, Jackson endorsed Hillary Clinton after she won the Democratic nomination. In 2020, he invited Joe Biden to address Rainbow PUSH. After initially supporting Bernie Sanders, Jackson endorsed Biden after Sanders left the race. He predicted that African American women would support Biden in large numbers. In 2023, Jackson stepped down from the leadership of Rainbow PUSH due to his advanced age and a diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease. He has been hospitalized numerous times for complications related to this disease.
Jesse Jackson’s involvement in Black civil rights leadership and social justice has spanned more than 50 years. During that period he has reimagined and set the course for the trajectory of Black Civil Rights. Focusing on economic and political empowerment, Jackson’s work has increased Black presence in corporate America, accentuated the centrality of Black businesses and the economic plight of Black Americans as inextricably tied to societal advancement for African Americans. His forays into international relations demonstrates the continued importance of African American recognition of the social, cultural, political and economic ties that exist between African Americans and the broader world. Jackson has also been central to promoting the idea of self-empowerment and cultural awareness among African Americans. His endorsement of the term African American reaffirmed the cultural ties between African Americans and the African diaspora. His slogan “I am Somebody” and “Black is Beautiful” continue to be widely used in the Black community. His presidential runs remain significant, especially to this writer, as one of the first examples in modern history of an African American who dared to dream. And in doing so lifted an entire race to majestic heights.