Jackson, Jesse Louis

Jackson, Jesse Louis (b. 8 Oct. 1941). US civil rights leader He was born in Greenville, South Carolina, and studied at the University of Illinois and the Chicago Theological Seminary. He rose through the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to become an aide to Martin Luther King, and stood near King when the latter was shot. After King's death, he began to try to expand the civil rights movement to focus on the economic inequalities in American life for people of all races. He adopted a tone as sensitive to class as to colour, and tried to build up a ‘rainbow coalition’ of all minorities to overcome the traditional White, male power structure in the USA. He became one of the most prominent and influential African Americans in the USA by 1980, and the first serious African American contender for the Presidency when he ran for the Democratic nomination in the 1984 primary elections. In 1988 he came closer to winning the nomination of a major party than any Black man before or since, with the possible exception of Colin Powell in 1996. Under President Clinton, he served on repeated humanitarian missions, securing (amongst others) the return of three US soldiers in Yugoslavia, 1999. In 2001, his image was tarnished by revelations that he was the father of an illegitimate child, as well as of financial irregularities in some of his organizations. Nevertheless, he continued to be one of the most prominent and popular African American leaders.