Jesse Jackson: titan of US civil rights movement leaves legacy of hope – The Latest

0:00This is The Guardian.

0:11Jessie Jackson was incredibly political campaign, not just for racial justice, but economic justice. The only time that we win is when we come together. Jessie Jackson was always really clear-eyed that our struggles were connected, whether we are queer or black or brown or Latino. or disabled. And so really remembering that he was a titan of the civil rights movement and an icon of the African American community, but also he saw injustice around the world and wanted to fight it in all its forms. A trailblazing figure in the US civil rights movement has died. So how should we remember the Reverend Jesse Jackson?

0:51From the Guardians today in Focus, this is The Latest with me, Lucy Hoth. I'm joined by Carys Afoko, who is a Guardian contributing writer and host of the podcast Over the Top, Under the Radar. Thanks so much for coming into the studio, Carys. So the news today that the Reverend Jesse Jackson has died, a titan of the civil rights movement and a fixture of American politics for more than 50 years. Obviously, there's so much to take in in terms of his life. But what are you reflecting on today? I think there are a couple of things I think I mean on the one hand it must you know you think you just want to send condolences to his family and the people that knew him personally you know he lived until 84 but it's always incredibly sad to lose a loved one I think beyond that I guess there are a couple of things Jesse Jackson's name might be familiar to people he's been as you say a fixture of American politics and the American civil rights movement and he really I guess he is a dying breed of African-American leader who was born during segregation.

1:52He was born in the 1940s. So, you know, his school was segregated. So someone who really lived through and campaigned for the transformation of American society in the 60s, the civil rights movement, you know, someone who was mentored by Martin Luther King. So I think a sense of sadness at losing that generation of leader who really transformed not just America, but the world. And I guess I'm thinking a lot about his legacy and his politics. And I think there's a real risk when we lose people like Jesse Jackson I think it happened with Martin Luther King I think it happened with Mandela that we sort of defang them and depoliticize them but Jesse Jackson was incredibly political campaign not just for racial justice but economic justice was a pan-Africanist I'm half Ghanaian he spent a lot of time in Ghana so really trying to remember the sort of breadth of his legacy as well as the things he's most famous for yeah so talking about those things that he's most famous for before we come on to his political legacy, which as you say is vast.

2:53He was a member of the Greenville Eight in the early 1960s when his activism began at college. So he was born in South Carolina, heavily segregated in the 1940s. And like many people in the civil rights movement, he experienced segregation firsthand. He tried to take a book out of his local library. He got into university. He was a very talented American football player. he wasn't allowed to take the book out because he wasn't white and it was a whites only library and so then he became part of the Greenville Eight which was an organized protest against segregation of libraries it was successful the court ruled that segregation was unlawful but it really reflects a lot of the activism at that time of the the young people in the 50s and 60s who were putting their bodies on the line to protest segregation and in some ways it's hard to imagine the sort of personal risk that that involved but yes he was an activist from a really young age and then went on to be mentored by Martin Luther King.

3:51Yeah so they met in the early 1960s didn't they and it was a very close relationship and Jesse Jackson was present in 1968 when Luther King was assassinated in Memphis Tennessee which he's spoken about as as leaving this enormous impact on him right? Yeah again it's just it's something that's hard to imagine you know there's a picture of him and Martin Luther King on the balcony outside the hotel. So he witnessed the assassination of his mentor of this huge giant of the civil rights movement, who'd very much kind of like taken him into his organization, encouraged his activism. Jesse Jackson was also a minister.

4:28And this moment, which I mean, I think, you know, could have immobilized so many of us, he channeled his grief and his trauma into more activism and, you know, continued to be a leader of the civil rights movement, led an organisation called Operation Breadbasket. And I think it's really important to remember that like Martin Luther King, Jesse Jackson was really focused on economic inequality as well as racial inequality and really seeing the connections between those two things. Most of the organisations he founded or led were about poverty and inequality as well as racial justice. Yeah, I was just reading an interview that he gave to The Guardian in 2020, one of the last interviews because he'd been very ill for some time hadn't he um but talking about the economic disparities for african-americans during the covid pandemic something that he was acutely aware of right until his later life in in his late 70s yeah i read that interview and i i would recommend people go and take a look at it it's there's something about the fire that's still there um and that burning sense of injustice and what is right and he's really i mean i think it must have been quite early in the covid pandemic when there was still all of this misinformation swirling about whether black people could get the virus or whether they couldn't and he's so clear-eyed about the ways that existing injustice magnifies the pandemic um and talks about not only how the virus doesn't discriminate but how the discrimination exists means that the virus hits some people harder than others and again um you get the pan-Africanism there because he talks about people on the African continent and you know I think it's really important to remember that Jesse Jackson is only American because his ancestors were brought over from Africa as slaves and that tinges a lot of his politics but I think that that the sort of seeking and desire to go back to Africa and Ghana he spent a lot of time in Ghana because he thinks that's maybe where his family came from he can't be sure but I thought all of that was still in that interview, that sense of global inequality, like the passion for a better world.

6:30And, you know, he'd written to President Trump a couple of times, that sense of still petitioning, still campaigning, still pushing, which I just, I just find it so inspiring. I don't know if I'd have had the energy. Yeah, if I'll have the energy in my 70s to be doing that. Yeah, so he ran for president twice, didn't he? The first time in 1984. But very movingly, when Barack Obama won in 2008, he saluted Jesse Jackson, saying that Jackson had really paved the way for Obama's victory so that legacy is clear yeah and he so he ran twice in the 80s once before I was born um 1984 and once in 1988 he wasn't the first black person to run to be president or to run for the democratic nomination that was Shirley Chisholm um an amazing black feminist um campaigner I think it's important to say but yeah he ran twice to be president and I think the differences between his run and Obama's run Jesse Jackson running for president was much more confronting than Obama because this is like a child of segregation someone who grew up in the south um who was clear-eyed about the injustices of America and about the inequality that African Americans faced and you know he got closer with his 1988 run he didn't get so far as in 1984 and I think it's interesting that you know Obama's candidacy Obama was American um whatever President Trump may say but he you know he didn't have that legacy of being an African-American whose family had come over as slaves and there was something I think that was for many people maybe less confronting about that but I thought it was a beautiful moment that he really credited Jesse Jackson within his lifetime so much changed and within his lifetime you know his candidacy went from being a fringe most protest candidacy to being the thing that like you know laid the foundations for the first black president and I mean there are some really beautiful scenes of him sort of weeping and being moved at Obama's inauguration that I think uh yeah touched all of us lots of good videos to re-watch um there's a really beautiful one as well you know so many there was so much going on that time but he's also a real proponent of the black is beautiful movement and a real there are some beautiful speeches of him doing a call and response to black people saying like I'm beautiful I deserve love you know I deserve to take up space and I think that's the other thing I'm thinking a lot about um his activism came from like love and care for his community.

8:45So his family in a statement have said that they want his memory to be honoured by the fight for the values that he lived by. Karis how would you summarise those values do you think? Yeah I mean I think he was always very clear in his slogans that his politics was rooted in hope and I think that feels pretty dark right now in a number of ways and I think remembering someone whose life was incredibly hard and he had to like claw and climb his way out of the life he was born into like keeping that hope alive I think is really important I think the other thing to remember and like fighting against the odds against systems that feel really unjust I think the other thing to remember Jesse Jackson was always really clear-eyed that our struggles were connected whether we are queer or black or brown or latino or disabled and so really remembering that he was a titan of the civil rights movement and an icon of the african-american community but also he saw injustice around the world and wanted to fight it in all its forms so remembering that you know we really are connected our struggles are connected um and yeah keeping that hope in times that maybe it feels a bit dark or it feels like it might be hard to triumph um i think he's his life story is a real yeah is a real challenge to that idea well caris an incredible legacy thank you so much.

10:07Thanks for having me on the show. That's it for today. My huge thanks again to Carissa Foco, who is a communication strategist, a writer and host of the brilliant podcast Over the Top, Under the Radar. Do have a listen if you haven't already and we'll put a link in our show notes as well. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Latest, the new evening edition of Today in Focus. Today in Focus will be back tomorrow morning and we'll be back tomorrow night. This episode was presented by me, Lucy Hoff. The producer was Bryony Moore. The senior producer was Ryan Ramgobin and the lead producer was Zoe Hitch.

10:45This is The Guardian.