Jackson, Jesse Louis 1941-
US politician and clergyman

Born in Greenville, North Carolina, the adopted son of a janitor, he won a football scholarship to Illinois University before entering a Chicago seminary. He was ordained a Baptist minister in 1968 and as a charismatic preacher and black-activist politician, he worked with Martin Luther King, before establishing Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity, 1971) to promote the economic advancement of black people. He was a candidate for the Democratic 1984 presidential nomination, being the first black American to mount a serious campaign for the office and constructing what he termed a 'Rainbow Coalition' of liberal and minority groups, won a fifth of the delegates' votes. He lost the nomination to Walter Mondale. In 1986 he successfully campaigned for US disinvestment in South Africa. He came second to Michael Dukakis in the Democrats' 1988 presidential nomination contest, doubling his 1984 vote share.

Bibliography: Ernest R House, Jesse Jackson and the Politics of Charisma (1989)