Send Me, Jesse Said

Woefully belatedly - but seeking hope and light - we honor the remarkable life of Rev. Jesse Louis Jackson, who over six decades "stepped forward again and again and again" to fight for racial, social, economic justice for millions of the disenfranchised. At a moving "Homegoing," his kids offered soul-stirring tributes to the impassioned, "prophetic voice" of a man of faith who doggedly "opened doors, kicked them down when necessary, so that others were no longer locked out....You fought a good fight."

Two ceremonies over two days of prayers, pride, tears, laughs, eulogies and gospel music sought in their own singular ways to celebrate the long rich life life of Jesse Jackson - pastor, activist, organizer, two-time presidential candidate, and head of an ever-evolving "rainbow coalition” of the poor and dispossessed that sought to bridge all conceivable divides. When Jackson died in February at age 84, he was hailed as "a civil rights giant," and he was. On April 4, 1968 in Memphis, the then-26-year-old aide to Martin Luther King was standing in the courtyard below the balcony of the Lorraine Motel, talking to King moments before he was shot and killed. Jackson carried on King's work in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference until 1971, when he resigned amidst leadership changes to form what became the Rainbow PUSH (People United to Save Humanity) Coalition.

But his work grew ever broader, working for decades on multiple fronts for multiple social justice issues in America and around the world. He pushed for voting rights, Native rights, Palestinian rights, welfare rights, tenants' rights, prisoners' rights, women's and gay and trans rights; he led boycotts, fair wage battles, union organizing campaigns; he fought against apartheid in South Africa and helped facilitate the release of U.S. hostages in Iran. He spent years spreading the mantra, per his iconic 1972 appearance on Sesame Street with a ragtag, multi--hued bunch of kids, "I am somebody." A simple message with a big meaning, it hit its mark again and again. "When I hear the phrase 'I am somebody,'" said 13-year-old Daniel Russell-Vincent, attending the March 6 People’s Celebration with his parents, "that makes me think, 'You're going to have something to do with this world.'"

That official, five-hour gathering - video here - was held at the 10,000-seat sanctuary of the House of Hope Church on Chicago’s South Side. It drew three former US presidents, white and black pols from Maxine Waters (87) to Tennessee's Justin Pearson (31), local pastors and dignitaries, the presidents of Congo and South Africa, and thousands of regular Chicagoans who skipped work, drove for hours, and stood in long lines to "show up and say what (Jesse) meant to us, and more importantly what he stood for....Every single person here has a Jesse Jackson story." "The city of Chicago shared him with the whole world," said Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker. "He was ours, and we were his." "This man has been here my whole life, saying, 'I got you,'" said Detroit Pistons Hall of Famer Isaiah Thomas, who grew up on Chicago’s West Side. "That's what Rev. Jesse Jackson means to us in Chicago."

The speeches were eloquent. Bill Clinton: "He lived a big life. He lived with his head and with his heart." Kamala Harris: "He did not waste time waiting, even when the doors in front of him were barred and bolted." Joe Biden: "Jesse kept hope alive for us." Barack Obama, with the stately oratory he draws on in moments of loss, spoke of a child of a poor single mother whose father rejected him, whose first political act was to lead seven black students into a whites-only college library, where they sat down, refused to leave and "got arrested for reading. Think about that. That's how freedom opens its doors." In the Book of Isaiah, he said, "God is looking for a messenger to guide a hardened and resistant people, and the Lord asks, 'Who shall I send?' to which Isaiah replies, 'Here I am, Lord, send me.' Send me, Jesse said, even as a young man. And the world got a little bit better."

He recounted Jackson's life, from his sharecropper family to the Chicago Theological Seminary to Operation Breadbasket to, after MLK's murder, a "country weary of the idea of justice," where "a talker with his immense gifts...rose above despair, and kept that righteous flame alive." "When the poor and dispossessed needed a champion and the country needed healing, the Reverend Jesse Louis Jackson stepped forward again and again and again, and said, 'Send me,'" Obama declared, "even while growing up in a world separate and unequal, a world designed to tell a child that he or she could only go so far...'I am somebody.' He was talking about everyone who was left out, everyone who was forgotten, everyone who was unseen (and) unheard. And in that sense he was expressing the very essence of what our democracy should be, the ideals at the very heart of the American experiment."

Jackson also "paved the way for so many to follow." In 1984, as another child of a single mom and new college grad "with good intentions but uncertain how to serve," living in a "janky apartment" with a rabbit-eared-TV, he saw Jackson "own" his first presidential debate. Drawn to Chicago as a young organizer, he went to PUSH headquarters on Saturday mornings "to listen and learn...and when Jesse called your name, you stood up a little straighter (to) make things right." Today, "it can be hard to hope," when each day "you wake up to things you didn’t think were possible" - greed, bigotry, ignorance, cruelty - and "it's tempting to just put your head down and wait for the storm to pass." "But this man," he said, voice breaking, pointing to the coffin, "inspires us to take a harder path. He calls on us (to) be messengers of hope, to step forward and say, 'Send me'...'Cause if we don't step up, no one else will."

The next day, a private, emotional "Homegoing" at the Rainbow PUSH Coalition headquarters drew local leaders, allies, friends and family to a celebration where several of Jackson's six grown kids - all at the podium, proof "he raised smart, God-fearing children" - gave searing speeches that often drew tears and amen's from the lively crowd. (Full, moving video here). Jackson had been in failing health for several years; his daughter Jacqueline, his main caregiver, thanked the thousands of doctors, nurses, cooks, Uber drivers and other caretakers who helped him through that time. His son Yusef, who now leads the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, vowed their work will continue "in his name." His eldest son Jesse Jackson Jr., seeking to tell the crowd "who my daddy was" and often weeping as he did, wove a forceful, complex tale that moved from light to darkness and back again.

"We are burying our father today," he declared with feeling, before praising his father's "consistent, prophetic voice." "Who was Jesse Jackson?" he asked. "To the political class that took up most of his time, he was a stranger awaiting a return phone call, reminding (them) of the urgency of the hour." At the same time, critiquing the former day's speeches portraying his father in strictly political terms, he insisted that as a Baptist minister and man of faith "he had a tense relationship with the political order," not based on race or party but "on his unyielding advocacy for the disinherited, the damned, the dispossessed, the disrespected." As such, he demanded solutions "deeply rooted in his own Christian faith," in "his own sense of urgency," and in "the daily lives of (those) he sought to raise up...He took the ministry from Sunday morning, and he delivered it to the people.”

He was also "a funny man, an enjoyable man," he noted. When he was born, his father was doing voter registration work in Selma, and was so overwhelmed by his son's birth "he almost named me Selma." But there were dark times as well: "Being Jesse has not been easy - such was the name of Jesse Jackson." A former Congressman, Jackson Jr. struggled with bipolar depression, and ended up doing time in prison after a 2013 campaign fraud conviction ended his 17-year political career. He tearfully described feeling despair "in the hole," pleading with his father to "get me outta here," and his father urging, "Hold your head up high, son." (Jackson Sr. sought a pardon from Biden, who refused it.) In his soaring, painful, heartfelt eulogy, Jackson Jr. described his father as a transformative figure who "we turned to in our lowest hours...We are better because he lived."

He was echoed by his brother and U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson, who in a soaring speech called their father "a miracle, a special occurrence, a force of nature (who) would not be denied." He praised "the iterations of Jesse Jackson Sr. we have seen...Born to be a nobody, he was too tall to hide, too poor to be included, too black to be respected, too bold to be ignored...Look at what the Lord has done." Above all, he said his father was not a politician but "a public servant." The measure of his humanity: "Only somebody who's been claimed by something greater than themselves can stand up for people whose names they don't even know. My father tried to help somebody, to love somebody, to let every child know he is somebody. My father wanted to make sure the world he was leaving was better than the world he was born into. He tried to make the crooked way straight."

Jesse Louis Jackson was, of course, fully human. For decades, he tried mightily, and sometimes he failed. But, his son argued, "He honored the ideals of the Constitution more than any of the 25 slave-holders who signed it in their hypocrisy, and he believed in America more than America believed in itself." Calling out to his father's many mentors - Martin Luther KingJr., Nelson Mandela, Rosa Parks, Nehru, Gandhi, Castro, all the freedom fighters - Jonathan said, "We have not forgotten, and we will keep fighting for the peacemakers, for civil rights, for equity, diversity, inclusion." Rise, Jesse, rise. Amidst the base, ghastly human dregs that now inhabit our national landscape and wield harrowing power over it, here lived a great man. May he rest in peace and power.

An attendee at the People's Celebration for the Rev. Jesse Jackson holds a program with his imagePhoto by K'Von Jackson