As funeral services for Rev. Jesse Jackson begin this week, a professor said his early connections to rural Illinois helped shape his civil rights legacy.
Jackson, who was born and raised in South Carolina, spent his first year of college at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign on a football scholarship.
Marsha Barrett, associate professor of history at the university, said she teaches about Jackson in a course called "Hidden Political Figures."
"Most people I talk about are far more hidden than Jesse Jackson," Barrett noted. "But I include him because young people, they know the name Jesse Jackson, but they're not really aware about why he was so prominent or how he left this major imprint on the Democratic Party."
Barrett pointed out that it was during Jackson's time at the University of Illinois that he first experienced Northern racism. She believes his short stint living in the state helped motivate him to become a civil rights activist and ultimately led to him establishing a "home base" in Illinois later in life.
Barrett added Jackson was ahead of his time in many regards, embracing strategies now used by modern-day political influencers. She explained he was effective in drawing attention to the local and global causes he championed, and his work centered around calling out injustices.
"The way that he was able to keep attention on himself is something I think is relatable to our students, to be something necessary, to actually be heard," Barrett emphasized. "There’s silos, and if you want to be able to reach a lot of people, you need to cultivate that attention. And that was something that he was very good at doing, even though sometimes it led to criticism."
Barrett argued Jackson served as a bridge between generations of Black leaders. She added that the complexity of his identity as an activist, moral figure, and politician allowed him to challenge the status quo while maintaining independence from the establishment.
"In the era we live in today where so many Americans feel jaded about formal politics and politicians in particular, voters are looking for someone who's bigger than a party," Barrett observed. "Jesse Jackson was bigger than the Democratic Party. And maybe he provides an example of what voters are looking for even today."
Illinois News Source originally published this story.
