The Rev. Jesse Jackson rose to prominence in the shadow of Martin Luther King Jr.’s ghastly assassination. Mr. Jackson was 26 at the time — the same age Dr. King had been when he emerged as a leader of the Montgomery bus boycott.
Mr. Jackson captured the nation’s attention for more than half a century with his tireless activism, his pioneering presidential campaigns and his dazzling oratory.
His influence can be measured by the recognition that neither his most renowned mentee, the Rev. Al Sharpton, nor former President Barack Obama, the ever-popular Democratic politician, would enjoy their perches without Mr. Jackson’s groundbreaking achievements.
Quite simply, Jesse Jackson led one of the most consequential American lives. He was a genuine populist who stood in stark contrast to the ersatz populists of today.
Like all Black Southerners of his generation, as a young man, Mr. Jackson was denied equal access to public libraries, public transportation, public accommodations, department stores, restaurants, water fountains and voting booths.
In the early 1960s, he became a movement leader, already driven to clip the vicious wings of Jim Crow. In 1965, around the time of the Bloody Sunday march, he went to Alabama to join the voting rights campaign led by, among others, Dr. King.
He would soon become the head of the Chicago chapter of Operation Breadbasket, the arm of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference dedicated to Black economic uplift, a goal he preached about and worked toward for the rest of his life.
Dr. King delivered his immortal 1968 “Mountaintop” speech in Memphis on the night before he was killed.
As he spoke about the striking sanitation workers whom he was there to support, he quoted Mr. Jackson, offering this summation: “As Jesse Jackson has said, ‘Up to now, only the garbagemen have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain.’”
Mr. Jackson’s influence grew with his leadership of his own organization, Operation PUSH, founded in 1971.
He headlined the National Black Political Convention, the 1972 gathering of Black activists and leaders in Gary, Ind., that aimed to expand the ranks of Black officeholders and develop a Black political agenda. “What time is it?” Mr. Jackson demanded, addressing the gathering in his thick Southern brogue. “Nation time!” the crowd roared.
Mr. Jackson confronted the hurdles faced by Black Americans: He led boycotts of Coca-Cola, Anheuser-Busch, Burger King, Nike and CBS television affiliates to push them to hire more Black workers, establish contracts with more Black-owned businesses and generate greater investment in Black communities.
The success of his efforts helped put more Black faces in important places and more money in Black pockets.
Though he began his career emphasizing the cause of Black civil rights, he became a civil rights leader for Americans from many different walks of life.
He had a string of successes as an American diplomat: In 1984, an American delegation led by Mr. Jackson negotiated the release of Robert Goodman, a Navy officer whose plane had been shot down in Lebanon.
That same year, Mr. Jackson negotiated the release of American and Cuban prisoners from Cuba. He did it again in 1990, bringing home dozens of hostages from Iraq and Kuwait.
