The Reverend Jesse Louis Jackson Resolution
WHEREAS, It is with great pleasure that the members of City Council of the City of Chicago are hereby informed of the life of the dedicated public servant the Reverend Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr., founder and president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, one of America's foremost civil rights, religious, and political figures;
WHEREAS, Reverend Jackson has been called the "Conscience of the Nation" and "the Great Unifier," challenging America to be inclusive and to establish just and humane priorities for the benefit of all. He is known for bringing people together on common ground across lines of race, culture, class, gender and belief. Over the past forty years, he has played a pivotal role in virtually every movement for empowerment, peace, civil rights, gender equality, and economic and social justice; and
WHEREAS, Born on October 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina, Jesse Jackson graduated from the public schools in Greenville and then enrolled in the University of Illinois on a football scholarship. He later transferred to North Carolina A&T State University and graduated in 1964. He began his theological studies at Chicago Theological Seminary but deferred his studies when he began working full-time in the Civil Rights Movement with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was ordained on June 30, 1968 by the Reverend Clay Evans of the historic Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church and received his earned Master of Divinity degree from Chicago Theological Seminary in 2000; and
WHEREAS, Reverend Jackson began his activism as a student in the summer of 1960 seeking to desegregate the local public library in Greenville and then as a leader in the sit-in movement. In 1965, he became a full-time organizer for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He was soon appointed by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to direct the Operation Breadbasket program; and
WHEREAS, In December of 1971, Reverend Jackson founded Operation PUSH (Pe...
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