A day after former presidents, sitting governors and local Chicago residents alike attended a vibrant, televised celebration for the late Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., the family and friends who knew him best hosted a more intimate gathering Saturday to grieve the civil rights leader at his organization’s headquarters.
The final memorial service at the Rainbow PUSH Coalition’s headquarters on the South Side of Chicago includes only a few hundred attendees, most of whom are family members, allies and confidants. The home-going is meant as a capstone to a week of services and a rally to continue Jackson’s activism.
In rounds of speeches, Jackson’s children and close civil rights allies said the best way to honor his father’s legacy was to continue his advocacy for universal human rights and economic justice.
“It is appropriate that we respect this season of grief,” said Yusef Jackson, one of late reverend’s sons and president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition. “However, it is also appropriate to honor him by stepping up, to step out, and continue his work by answering his call to serve.”
The younger Jackson said that the Rainbow PUSH Coalition had honored Jackson by deepening partnerships with activists in Minnesota, which saw mass protests after the Trump administration launched the largest ever Homeland Security operation in the state.
U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson, an Illinois Democrat and one of the late reverend’s sons, said that his father “taught me that any society that will not support the many who are poor will never be able to save the few who are rich.” He said that his father’s relentless activism and charisma were rooted in a Christian call to service.
“For the children on the reservations, in the barrios, in the ghettos, he was speaking to you,” said the congressman. “My father was attacked for speaking about diversity. He was vilified for his stand on equality, and had the people who wanted to kill him had their way, we would have never seen a rainbow coalition.”
Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League, said during the service that ambitious politicians should emulate Jackson’s political strategy.
“Let the word go out that anyone who would like to be president of the United States in 2028, you better study this concept of the rainbow coalition,” Morial said.
Members of the public are welcomed in to a more intimate home-going
Some members of the public who gathered outside the PUSH headquarters were allowed to enter the chamber.
“Over the last two weeks, we’ve been focusing on connecting to people that Reverend worked with across the years,” said the Rev. Janette Wilson, a longtime senior adviser to Jackson and executive director at Rainbow PUSH Coalition. “When you look at his work, it is so vast in the economic and political arenas.”
Since his death last month, Jackson’s family and allies have honored the late reverend with commemorations, community service and demonstrations they say continue his work.
Mourners first honored Jackson as he lay in repose in Chicago last month. The late reverend then lay in state at the South Carolina Capitol. Jackson grew up in segregated Greenville, South Carolina. As a high schooler, he led fellow students into a protest that desegregated a local library, starting a lifetime of civil rights leadership.
Services honoring Jackson in Washington, D.C., were postponed after a request for him to lie in honor at the U.S. Capitol was denied. House Republican leadership cited the precedent that only former presidents and senior generals regularly receive the privilege.
Jackson’s mentees also organized efforts to continue his civil rights activism.
Wilson said that at the end of his life, Jackson was thinking intently about how to address poverty and food insecurity in communities across the country. She added that he would have wanted allies to address issues like the socioeconomic effects of artificial intelligence, how to improve public education and solutions to youth mental health and the growing loneliness epidemic in the country.
She also said that Jackson never shied away from being political.
“We’re in a global moment where peace in the world is in jeopardy, where we just have bombs being dropped carelessly, killing children, innocent victims of political actions,” said Wilson of the ongoing war in the Middle East. “When the government cuts SNAP benefits and you have millions of children and families who will be food insecure, I think you have to tell them that we’re fighting for you.”
Fraternity brothers, Minnesota activists salute him at PUSH headquarters
On Thursday, the headquarters hosted a series of events that celebrated Jackson’s life.
Jackson’s life “is a dream fulfilled,” said Michael Barksdale Jr., one of several hundred members of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc. who honored Jackson at a private ceremony on Thursday. A Chicago public school counselor who first met Jackson as a high school freshman, Barksdale said the PUSH Coalition awarded him a college scholarship after he worked as one of the group’s local youth organizers.
“It is up to my generation now to continue that legacy of Jackson and all the civil rights dignitaries who came before,” said Barksdale, 37. “They did all of the heavy lifting, and we are going to continue to build.”
That same night, the chamber hosted a reunion for Rainbow PUSH alumni to commemorate the late reverend and his years of activism.
They celebrated Jackson’s life and reminisced about his dual presidential bids; his globe-trotting activism as an anti-apartheid activist and hostage negotiator; and his evangelism for a Christianity that emphasized justice for all and support for the downtrodden.
The headquarters also greeted nearly 100 Minnesota activists earlier in the week to learn more about Jackson’s strategies and find resources for their own organizations.
The gathering was a prelude to both the private service for Jackson’s family and another commemoration.
Reverend’s family expected in Alabama for voting rights march
On Sunday, members of the Jackson family and many of Jackson’s mentees will travel to Selma, Alabama, to commemorate the “Bloody Sunday” protest marches when civil rights activists were beaten by police on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in 1965.
Jackson himself often attended the same anniversary march.
“Reverend always thought three-dimensionally,” said Jimmy Coleman, a longtime aide to Jackson and native of Selma.
“Selma has always stood for the basics of what civil rights is, what we are debating in policy. He was always focused on what we needed in terms of policy in any given political moment, and that’s what the march represents,” Coleman said.
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