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| Rev. Jesse Jackson (photo for the Sun-Times by Ashlee Rezin) |
“I may be poor ...” began the call-and-response Rev. Jesse Jackson led in various forms before rapt audiences for more than half a century. “But I am ... somebody! I may be on welfare. But I am ... somebody! I may be in jail. But I am ... somebody! I may be uneducated, But I am ... somebody. I am Black. Beautiful. Proud. I must be respected. I must be protected. I am ... somebody!”
That, in essence, is the message Rev. Jackson devoted his life to championing — for Black people in general and himself in particular. From leading Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s open housing campaign in Chicago in 1964, through his close association with the great civil rights leader during the last three years of King’s life, to the tumultuous 1970s, when Jackson started what became the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, to the 1980s, when he ran the first viable presidential campaign by a Black candidate in the United States, to the 1990s, when he traveled the globe, to free hostages, advise leaders, join picket lines and lend his internationally famous name to often desperate causes. To his later years, when he settled into the role as a revered elder statesman of Black Chicago and an unceasing voice for social justice.
Rev. Jackson died at age 84 on Tuesday, the family said in a statement. He had been in declining health for a decade; in 2017 he announced he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease two years earlier, but last April revealed that it was actually misdiagnosed progressive supranuclear palsy, a condition also affecting bodily movements. He stepped down as president of PUSH in July 2023, citing health concerns. Rev. Jackson appeared onstage at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August 2024, when he was presented to the crowd after a video celebrating his life, but did not speak.
If the legend of his mentor, Martin Luther King was simplified, almost beatified, by early death — a martyr at 39, an icon who had a dream — then the legacy of his eager protege was complicated by long life. Rev. Jesse Jackson was in the public eye for six decades, a tireless wielder of social pressure. He was respected and dismissed, inspiring adoration and disdain, a Chicago institution who left footprints on the world stage, an ardent advocate for civil rights whose attempts to wield political power himself were thwarted, and channeled into the power of protest, persuasion and complaint.
”Yet, there are doubts and criticisms raised about this complex man, a man characterized by ambiguity and contradiction,” the New York Times magazine wrote about him in 1972. “He is a brilliant speaker, a skilled mobilizer. He is also vain and self-seeking, a star, a man of great ambition, a man who, at times, uses the tricks of a demagogue.”
Which is another way to describe a powerful orator who inspired and uplifted millions of people, whether one-on-one or through the media he played skillfully around the world. In everything he did, Jackson was always pushing to be counted and make a difference. To be somebody.
He was born under highly unpromising circumstances, on Oct. 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina, in a three-room, tin-roofed house without running water. His mother was an unwed 16-year-old high school student named Helen Burns. His father, Noah Robinson, was a married neighbor more than twice her age — 33 — with three stepchildren.
When Jesse was a toddler, his mother married Charles Jackson, who adopted Jesse when he was about 12. Charles Jackson worked as a janitor, and sometimes young Jesse would help him clean buildings.
It was a deeply segregated time and place. When baseball star Jackie Robinson came to Greenville for the NAACP, he wasn’t allowed to use the bathroom at the airport. Young Jesse was taunted for his stammer, which would return in moments of excitement later in life. His mother was his first adoring audience. She always told him, Rev. Jackson later recalled: “You’re going to be somebody. Just hold on.”
His calling came early.
“Jesse was an unusual kind of fella, even when he was just learning to talk,’’ Robinson remembered. ‘’He would say he’s going to be a preacher. He would say, ‘I’m going to lead people through the rivers of water.’‘’
That, in essence, is the message Rev. Jackson devoted his life to championing — for Black people in general and himself in particular. From leading Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s open housing campaign in Chicago in 1964, through his close association with the great civil rights leader during the last three years of King’s life, to the tumultuous 1970s, when Jackson started what became the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, to the 1980s, when he ran the first viable presidential campaign by a Black candidate in the United States, to the 1990s, when he traveled the globe, to free hostages, advise leaders, join picket lines and lend his internationally famous name to often desperate causes. To his later years, when he settled into the role as a revered elder statesman of Black Chicago and an unceasing voice for social justice.
Rev. Jackson died at age 84 on Tuesday, the family said in a statement. He had been in declining health for a decade; in 2017 he announced he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease two years earlier, but last April revealed that it was actually misdiagnosed progressive supranuclear palsy, a condition also affecting bodily movements. He stepped down as president of PUSH in July 2023, citing health concerns. Rev. Jackson appeared onstage at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August 2024, when he was presented to the crowd after a video celebrating his life, but did not speak.
”Yet, there are doubts and criticisms raised about this complex man, a man characterized by ambiguity and contradiction,” the New York Times magazine wrote about him in 1972. “He is a brilliant speaker, a skilled mobilizer. He is also vain and self-seeking, a star, a man of great ambition, a man who, at times, uses the tricks of a demagogue.”
Which is another way to describe a powerful orator who inspired and uplifted millions of people, whether one-on-one or through the media he played skillfully around the world. In everything he did, Jackson was always pushing to be counted and make a difference. To be somebody.
He was born under highly unpromising circumstances, on Oct. 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina, in a three-room, tin-roofed house without running water. His mother was an unwed 16-year-old high school student named Helen Burns. His father, Noah Robinson, was a married neighbor more than twice her age — 33 — with three stepchildren.
When Jesse was a toddler, his mother married Charles Jackson, who adopted Jesse when he was about 12. Charles Jackson worked as a janitor, and sometimes young Jesse would help him clean buildings.
It was a deeply segregated time and place. When baseball star Jackie Robinson came to Greenville for the NAACP, he wasn’t allowed to use the bathroom at the airport. Young Jesse was taunted for his stammer, which would return in moments of excitement later in life. His mother was his first adoring audience. She always told him, Rev. Jackson later recalled: “You’re going to be somebody. Just hold on.”
His calling came early.
“Jesse was an unusual kind of fella, even when he was just learning to talk,’’ Robinson remembered. ‘’He would say he’s going to be a preacher. He would say, ‘I’m going to lead people through the rivers of water.’‘’
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May perpetual light shine upon him.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the excellent remembrance.
ReplyDeleteHe spoke at my high school convocation in Charlotte, NC in 1978.
ReplyDeleteWhile I'm sure he did some good services for the CR's movement, like with the library, he seemed like an opportunist and King didn't really like him. His wife should have dumped him over the affairs that resulted in a child born with another woman.
ReplyDeleteA complicated man; who in spite of his flaws, did more good than most people would even attempt. A nicely balanced review of his life.
ReplyDeleteIn 1969 I had to write an essay on a charismatic person. I attended 2 Operation Breadbasket meetings at a movie theater on Halsted. hhis opening with the I am Somebody statements got the whole audience up and repeating them. It was inspiring. He definitely had charisma. I think of those statements often. I think that is what BLM was trying to say. As an older white woman I think it would be great if we could all remember that everyone is somebody and deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. ICE should have some training in that.
ReplyDeleteA brilliant and balanced obituary.
ReplyDeleteI just rewatched is "I am" piece on Sesame Street… I don't know how I feel about how far we've come
ReplyDeleteAnother one knocked out of the park, Mister S...one of your best and longest home runs (no pun intended). Objective and balanced. Learned a great deal that I hadn't known before.
ReplyDeleteLike so many other famous Somebodies, Jesse Jackson was a deeply complicated as well as a deeply flawed human being. He had an antipathy for Obama, as well as a decades-long relationship with our current POTUS. But he was also a champion of humanitarian causes, a powerful speaker, a skilled organizer, and an inspiration to millions around the world.
Like his mentor--MLK-- he is now free at last, free at last. May he rest in peace.