Jesse Jackson was the living bridge between King and Obama

Jackson’s two presidential runs brought the civil rights movement into the heart of the Democratic party and opened doors for others to walk throughHe witnessed the assassination of at the Lorraine motel in Memphis, Tennessee. Forty years later, he joined the jubilant crowd in Chicago’s Grant Park to greet ’s election victory and had tears streaming down his face., who died on Tuesday at the age of 84, was hailed by Martin Luther King III and his wife Andrea King as “a living bridge between generations”. He was the most influential African American political voice between King and Obama. His two runs for the Democratic nomination created the imaginative space for a Black president. He was the architect of a “rainbow coalition” that shapes the Democratic party today.