3 presidents, and thousands of everyday people, celebrate the life and legacy of Jesse Jackson

In life, the Rev. Jesse Jackson sought out the powerful with tireless intensity.

In death, the powerful sought him out, one last time, as three former U.S. presidents and a galaxy of luminaries paid tribute to the civil rights leader Friday on the South Side.

Former Presidents Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Joe Biden, former Vice President Kamala Harris and former first ladies Hillary Clinton and Jill Biden were joined by thousands of celebrants in a five-hour public homegoing service at the House of Hope, 752 E. 114th, a 10,000-seat facility in the Pullman neighborhood.

Obama brought up the country's divisive climate under the Trump administration and praised Jackson's voice of inspiration, calling on Americans to become "heralds of change." Many speakers spoke to this being a moment for the country not to despair, but to have faith and take action, as Jackson would have done.

Each day, Obama said, brings “some new assault on our democratic institutions, another setback to the idea of the rule of law, an offense to common needs.

"Each day we’re told … to fear each other, to turn on each other and that some Americans count more than others, and that some don’t even count at all. ... Everywhere, we see greed and bigotry being celebrated, and bullying and mockery masquerading as strength," he said.

Obama said it’s “tempting for some to compromise with power” or for Americans to simply put their heads down.

“But this man,” Obama said, pointing to Jackson’s casket, “Rev. Jesse Louis Jackson, inspires us to take a harder path. His voice called on each of us to be heralds of change, to be messengers of hope, to step forward and say, 'Send me wherever we have a chance to make an impact, whether it’s in our schools, our workplaces, our neighborhoods, our cities, not for faith, not for glory or because success is guaranteed, but because it gives our life purpose.'"

For Obama, that inspiration came from Jackson's 1984 presidential run. He described being a college student and sitting in a "janky apartment" in New York as he watched Jackson debate his opponents on TV.

"Jesse hadn’t just held his own — he had owned that stage," Obama said. "... And the message he sent to a 22-year-old child of a single mother, with a funny name — an outsider — was that maybe there wasn’t any place, any room, where we didn’t belong.

Jackson’s ‘courage of his convictions’

The celebration resounded with gospel music, and Jennifer Hudson belting out "A Change Gonna Come." Biden told the gathering that Jackson was "underrated, undeterred and unafraid."

"We had very different backgrounds, and in some cases different views, but never on race," Biden said. "Sometimes we went toe-to-toe and disagreed about issues. But that's what I admired most about Jesse: his passion, the courage of his convictions."

Clinton said he appeared at the House of Hope "more as a friend than a former president," adding that he had met Jackson at an anniversary celebrating the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.

"I came to truly love Jesse Jackson," Clinton said. "We both had more in common than we thought. We were two guys born to single mothers, living in the South.

"We did not always agree, but he made me a better president. He was always pushing on things."

Mayor Brandon Johnson, as well as former Mayors Lori Lightfoot and Richard M. Daley, attended, along with his brothers Bill Daley, a former Obama chief of staff, and Cook County Commissioner John Daley.

“People ask me what Jesse Jackson meant,” said Lightfoot. “Just look at this. ... Everyday Chicagoans felt he was their advocate.”

The Chicago service was the second-to-the-last stop in a funeral odyssey that echoed Jackson's life in constant motion — and included a stop in South Carolina, where he was born. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson refused the Jackson family's request that Jackson lie in honor in the Capitol rotunda in Washington, a stark reminder that the nation's commemoration of a civil rights icon comes at at a time when the Trump administration has been actively suppressing Black history.

‘You are somebody’

Detroit Pistons Hall of Famer Isiah Thomas recalled growing up in the 1960s looking up to Jesse Jackson as a civil rights hero.

"We had just come out of Jim Crow," Thomas said. "When society was telling me I was a nobody, when society was telling me we don't even want to go to school with you, this man walked up to me and my mom ... and then he did the unthinkable. Mama Jackson, your husband kneeled down, and he looked me in the eyes, and that man said, 'You are somebody.'"

Thomas cried as he recalled how Jackson comforted his family when his mother died. "He sent my momma off, beautiful words. When we were at our lowest, he lifted us up on those broad shoulders."

The celebration of Jackson's 84-year life was strong on style, with many attendees decked out in their Sunday best or funeral black. But there were a few baseball caps, and Mr. T., the 1980s television star, was there in in American flag coveralls.

Gov. JB Pritzker also spoke, beginning his remarks by quoting the Bible: "Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream. For Rev. Jesse Jackson each day was a new opportunity to bring justice in a too-often unjust world. His ambition was to shape a world where justice was not an anomaly, but a constant."

"While we shared him with the world, Rev. Jackson belonged to Chicago, and Chicago belonged to him," the governor said.

Biden also turned to Scripture, saying, "Jesse believed the Bible tells us that they that wait upon the Lord, shall renew their strength," Biden said. "They shall mount up with wings of eagles. They shall run and not be weary."

Johnson called Jackson " a brilliant strategist, an organizing savant.

“It was his instincts that understood that labor and faith were one and the same as Dr. King prophesied. It was his instincts to stand up against school closures and the shuttering of mental health clinics. It was his instincts that led protests down Michigan Avenue when a boy’s life was taken by a police officer and the government tried to cover it up. ... It was his instincts to run in ‘84 and ‘88, but not in ‘92, to make way for somebody in the Deep South and a brother on the South Side to become president of the United States,” Johnson said, referring to Clinton and Obama.

There was humor, too. Rabbi Steven Jacobs joked about Jackson arriving at the Pearly Gates and being met by God, who exclaims, "Oh my God, you're Jesse Jackson! You are somebody!"

‘A beautiful remembrance’

President Donald Trump was invited but did not attend, nor did the other living president, George W. Bush.

Harris, one of the last speakers, described Friday's celebration of Jackson's life and legacy as "a beautiful remembrance of his spirit, his life, his faith."

The former vice president said the day had renewed "her faith in what is possible"

"As a child, I was raised, when you see a closed door you should knock and wait to be invited in. What life has taught me is if that invitation is not offered, and that door remains shut after repeated attempts to knock on said door, sometimes you have no choice but to kick that door open," Harris said. "Rev. Jackson was impatient. He did not waste time waiting, even when the doors in front of him were barred and bolted. ... He always devised a way through."

Contributing: Tina Sfondeles