Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, one of the most influential figures in politics and social activism in the United States in recent decades, died at age 84, his family announced Tuesday (17). A Baptist pastor and close ally of Martin Luther King Jr., Jackson built a career marked by powerful oratory, historic presidential campaigns, and advocacy for marginalized communities.
“Our father was a servant leader – not just to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless and the marginalized around the world,” the Jackson family said, according to a Reuters report.
Diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2017, Jackson had been battling the illness for three years after experiencing symptoms. He had lived in Chicago for decades and remained active in public life even after his diagnosis.
The death occurs at a time of intense debate about historical memory and civil rights in the United States. The Trump administration has promoted measures aimed at reviewing public exhibits and monuments, justifying this by claiming it combats what it calls “anti-American” ideology. Civil rights advocates argue that such actions could compromise progress made over decades.
Two historic presidential campaigns
Jesse Jackson ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988, becoming one of the first African Americans to mount competitive campaigns nationally. In 1984, he garnered 3.3 million votes in the Democratic primaries, about 18% of the total, finishing third in the race won by Walter Mondale.
In the second contest, he won 6.8 million votes—29% of the total—won 11 primaries and state assemblies, and came in second in the party’s internal contest, behind Michael Dukakis. Jackson presented himself as an agent of transformation for Black, poor, and marginalized people.
At the 1988 Democratic National Convention in Atlanta, he delivered a speech that would become one of the most memorable of his career. “America is not a blanket woven with a single thread, a single color, a single fabric,” he told the delegates.
In another striking passage, he declared: “Wherever you are tonight, you can succeed. Keep your head held high, puff out your chest. You can succeed. Sometimes it gets dark, but morning comes. Don’t give up. Suffering builds character, character builds faith. In the end, faith will not disappoint.”
Origin in the segregated south
Born on October 8, 1941, in Greenville, South Carolina, Jackson grew up under the racial segregation laws known as Jim Crow. During his youth, he received a scholarship to play American football at the University of Illinois, but transferred to a historically Black institution after reporting experiences of discrimination. His activism began while he was still in college. He was arrested for trying to enter a public library restricted to white people in South Carolina. Later, he studied at Chicago Theological Seminary and was ordained a Baptist pastor in 1968.
Jackson became a close collaborator of Martin Luther King Jr. and was in Memphis on the day the leader was assassinated in 1968. After King’s death, he broke with the leadership of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and founded Operation PUSH in Chicago in the early 1970s. In 1984, he created the National Rainbow Coalition, aimed at expanding the civil rights agenda to include the rights of women and the LGBTQIA+ community. The two organizations merged in 1996. He stepped down as president of the Rainbow-PUSH Coalition in 2023, after more than five decades of leadership.
Source: brasil247.com