- 5 weeks ago
From civil rights champion to presidential hopeful, Jesse Jackson's life story is filled with pivotal moments that shaped American history. Join us as we explore his journey from Dr. King's protégé to international diplomat! Our countdown includes his founding of Operation PUSH, his controversial remarks, his diplomatic missions, and his witness to one of history's most tragic moments.
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00:00ABC News has confirmed Reverend Jesse Jackson has died.
00:03For more than five decades, he stood as a towering figure of the civil rights movement.
00:08Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're exploring the pivotal moments,
00:12defining achievements, and sometimes controversial aspects of Reverend Jesse Jackson's storied career.
00:27His mentorship under Martin Luther King, Jr.
00:30When he spoke, people left their cars and came out of trees and came out of buses.
00:35All forces gathered to hear him speak.
00:38When he spoke, it was just a thrilling, exciting moment, and something big was happening.
00:45Before he became a household name, a young Jesse Jackson found his calling
00:49under the guiding hand of one of history's most profound leaders.
00:53Jesse Jackson's journey into the national spotlight was inextricably linked to his close association
00:57with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, or SCLC.
01:02In March 1965, he traveled to Alabama to join King for the pivotal Selma to Montgomery March,
01:08a defining moment in the civil rights movement.
01:10Today, I want to say to the people of America and the nations of the world that we are not
01:17about to turn around.
01:19Yes, sir.
01:19We are on the move now.
01:21Yes, sir.
01:22Yes, we are on the move, and no wave of racism can stop us.
01:26Yes, sir.
01:27The burning of our churches will not deter us.
01:31Impressed by Jackson's drive and organizational skills, King recruited him, despite some concerns
01:35about his ambition.
01:36Jackson soon paused his divinity studies at Chicago Theological Seminary to dedicate himself
01:41full-time to the SCLC, becoming a key figure in King's inner circle by 1967.
01:47We didn't know how big nor how long, but that dream took us from the march on Washington to
01:53ultimately to Mandela's freedom in South Africa.
01:57That was a part of our dream.
01:59To the right to vote, part of our dream, from the balcony in Memphis where he was killed
02:04to the White House in 2008 by Barack Obama.
02:06That dream was a statement of our time for all times.
02:10Operation Breadbasket's Economic Justice.
02:12Let's go to Chicago, folks, where the first full history of a critical part of Chicago's
02:16fight for civil rights in the 1960s is being told for the first time in a new book.
02:20That book is called Operation Breadbasket, an Untold Story of Civil Rights in Chicago, 1966 through
02:261971.
02:27Building on the foundation of his mentorship, Jesse Jackson rose to prominence as the dynamic
02:32leader of Operation Breadbasket, an initiative originally launched by the SCLC in Atlanta
02:37in 1962.
02:38Jackson was appointed to head the Chicago branch of Operation Breadbasket in 1966 and was promoted
02:44to national director in 1967.
02:46The concept of jobs as an answer to some of our problems even today and the crime in our
02:52cities, jobs is the answer.
02:54Dr. King knew that and he brought a jobs project to Chicago where we could bring empowerment
03:00into the Black community through putting bread on the table, which is the whole point of Operation
03:06Breadbasket.
03:07Under Jackson's charismatic leadership, Operation Breadbasket in Chicago achieved significant
03:11victories.
03:12For instance, campaigns targeting dairy companies, soft drink bottlers, and supermarket chains resulted
03:17in thousands of new jobs for African Americans, injecting millions of dollars annually into the Black
03:22community.
03:23Operation Breadbasket's innovative approach demonstrated that economic justice was a vital component
03:28of the broader fight for civil rights.
03:30Young people need to know that Obama didn't come out of nowhere, that breadbasket is part of a long
03:39strain of justice-making, and Jesse Jackson was an important part of that.
03:44Building the Rainbow Coalition, from Operation Push to Rainbow Push.
03:48After Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination and growing tensions within the SCLC, Jesse Jackson sought an
03:54independent vehicle to pursue civil rights and economic justice.
03:57He founded Operation Push, People United to Save Humanity, in December 1971, based in Chicago.
04:03Building on Operation Breadbasket's economic strategy, Push pressed for fair hiring, expanded Black
04:09business opportunities, and self-help initiatives.
04:23Jackson widened that organizing model during his 1980s presidential campaigns.
04:28In 1984, he launched the National Rainbow Coalition to unite multiple marginalized constituencies around
04:34voting rights, social programs, and affirmative action.
04:37In 1996, Operation Push and the Rainbow Coalition merged as the Rainbow Push Coalition, consolidating
04:44advocacy on civil rights, voter mobilization, and public policy campaigns.
04:48Trailblazing presidential campaigns
04:50When Jesse Jackson walks the streets of Black Selma, he's among people who'll vote for him in
04:55overwhelming numbers. He represents for them what a generation ago was inconceivable — a Black man
05:01running for president and running strong. Inconceivable that on the Selma Bridge,
05:07where state troopers beat those marchers 23 years ago, a Black presidential candidate with police
05:13protection now holds a news conference.
05:16Ambition and rivalry within King's orbit helped push Jesse Jackson into electoral politics at a
05:21national scale. In 1984, he mounted a major bid for the Democratic presidential nomination,
05:26following Shirley Chisholm's trailblazing 1972 run, but breaking new ground as a mass nationwide contender.
05:33It's now the barracudas versus the small fish. And barracudas swim deep, and there ain't no lights down there. And
05:45barracudas eat up all small fish, no matter what color the fish may be.
05:50Jackson won five contests and drew about 3.28 million primary votes, becoming the first Black candidate to win a
05:57multi-state string of major party primaries.
05:59In 1988, he ran a stronger, better-funded campaign, expanding the Rainbow Coalition beyond his base to include more working
06:06-class voters and farmers.
06:08He won multiple contests, scored a headline-grabbing Michigan victory that briefly put him at the front of the pack,
06:13and finished with roughly 6.9 million votes overall.
06:17The Democrats have tried to make of Blacks a kind of Harlem Globetrotters. We provide the music, and the excitement,
06:22and the thrill of victory, and the marge of victory, and yet all the decisions are made upstairs by white
06:28males.
06:28We must renegotiate that relationship. The basic impediments to Black equity in politics now, paradoxically, is imposed upon us by
06:37the Democratic Party. It is in the South, but Democrats are strongest that Blacks are most restricted in their quest
06:42for political equality.
06:43His international diplomatic efforts.
06:46The Syrian announcement today about the release of Robert Goodman is interesting. It said it answered the appeal by Jesse
06:52Jackson and by the American government, clearly leaving open the possibility of an agreement with the Americans on Lebanon, although
06:59just as clearly that agreement will have to be on Syria's terms.
07:02In late December 1983, Jackson traveled to Syria to meet officials in Damascus. Lieutenant Robert O. Goodman Jr., a U
07:10.S. Navy pilot captured after his aircraft was shot down over Lebanon, was released and returned with Jackson on January
07:164, 1984.
07:18In June 1984, Jackson went to Havana and secured the release of 22 Americans and 26 Cuban political prisoners.
07:25When we let them out, we had to fly Russian planes from Havana to Washington for the first time in
07:32many, many years.
07:34How neat was that for you?
07:36It was a big deal. It was just a desire to relate to America more respectfully, mutually respectfully.
07:42After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, Jackson visited Baghdad and accompanied a group of foreign detainees who were allowed to
07:49leave Iraq.
07:49On May 2, 1999, he helped secure the handover of three U.S. Army soldiers captured by Yugoslav forces during
07:56the Kosovo War.
07:57These missions earned him global recognition and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2000.
08:02The cause of justice has no greater co-worker than Jesse Jackson.
08:07It's hard to imagine how we could have come as far as we have without the creative power, the keen
08:15intellect, the loving heart, and the relentless passion of Jesse Lewis Jackson.
08:25And God isn't done with him yet.
08:27His most controversial remark.
08:28I deny, and I do not recall ever making such a statement in any context that would be remotely construed
08:35as being either anti-Semitic or anti-Israel.
08:38However innocent and unintended, it was insensitive and wrong.
08:42During his first presidential campaign, Jackson was reported to have used derogatory language to refer to Jewish people, as well
08:49as Jewish neighborhoods in New York City, in a conversation with Washington Post reporter Milton Coleman.
08:54The disclosure triggered sharp backlash from Jewish leaders and civil rights allies, becoming a major campaign controversy.
09:00If I can win, any American can win.
09:03Because no longer will race or sex or religion or an insatiable military appetite be the prerequisite for winning.
09:11If I cannot win, the barriers have not come down.
09:15Therefore, most Americans cannot win.
09:17If I cannot win, no Latino American, no Jewish American, no Arab American, no woman, no labor leader can win.
09:26Jackson initially denied the allegations, but two days before the New Hampshire primary, he publicly acknowledged making the comments and
09:32apologized at a synagogue in Manchester, New Hampshire.
09:35The episode intensified when Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan defended Jackson and threatened Coleman, increasing public pressure on Jackson
09:42to distance himself from the rhetoric.
09:44Nobody asked me, Farrakhan, what do you mean?
09:48Are you threatening the Jewish community?
09:50I am warning America and warning Jews that we are tired of feeding our leaders to America like a piece
10:00of raw meat to a wild beast.
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10:18He was present at MLK's assassination.
10:21They said, no, we're going by Memphis first.
10:24These sanitation workers are real people.
10:27They have a significant work.
10:29If they don't clean up the germs, doctors can't do surgery.
10:33That's the truth.
10:34If they don't do their job, you can't smell, you can't survive the stench.
10:38You can't survive asthma.
10:39We're going to talk about the virtues of the sanitation workers.
10:41On April 4th, 1968, Jesse Jackson was at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, where Martin Luther King Jr. was
10:48supporting the sanitation workers' strike.
10:50When King stepped onto the balcony outside room 306 shortly before dinner, Jackson was in the motel courtyard below, and
10:56the two exchanged remarks about Jackson's attire.
10:59The king had said over and over again, you can't avoid ambush and sabotage.
11:05You cannot live with fear.
11:07The reference to death that night in the speech was he'd come to Memphis two days before.
11:13He had to empty the plane because of a threat to bomb the plane.
11:18And so at some point he said in the speech, I'm not fearing any man.
11:22Mine eyes have seen the glory and the coming of the Lord.
11:24King was shot at 6.01 p.m.
11:26Jackson later described being only feet away, though elements of his recollections, including claims about being with King in his,
11:33quote,
11:33last moments, have been disputed by other aides over the years.
11:37From that point on, Jackson spent the next half-century turning the movement's momentum into institutions and coalition politics.
11:44There's a portion that says King and his comrades often preached mock funerals for one another.
11:50Is that something that you all did back then?
11:52I don't want you to laugh.
11:54I guess it was our way of kind of letting it out.
11:57Someone said, well, if someone comes out and you will land in the casket, what do you want them to
12:01say over here?
12:04He's moving.
12:06Which aspect of Jackson's life do you find the most compelling?
12:09Is there anything we missed?
12:11Be sure to let us know in the comments.
12:12Okay.
12:15Bye.
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