Jesse Jackson’s Real Legacy

[SVPete]

Jesse Jackson’s Real Legacy

https://townhall.com/columnists/willalexander/2026/02/23/jesse-jacksons-real-legacy-n2671722

“In the confusion after Martin was killed, some people tried to step forward too quickly, without the movement’s consent,” wrote Ralph Abernathy, King’s best friend and closest confidant, in his book, And The Walls Came Tumbling Down. "Jesse was one of them. Jesse was always ambitious, always looking for the spotlight, and sometimes that ambition got ahead of the movement itself,” he wrote.

According to Andrew Young, Jackson was never part of King’s inner circle that worked on the daily strategy. But he was effective in front of the cameras.

“That was his gift,” Young said. “But that was different from how decisions were made inside the movement. … After Dr. King was killed, everybody was trying to figure out what came next. Jesse chose one path. Others chose different ones.”

It’s now clear that Jackson’s path, intentionally or not, did the heavy lifting to make the racial divide in America the irreversible mess it’s become today. It’s metastasized into a race industry only interested in its own survival as a tool for power, not in solving real problems.

Worse, Jackson’s fixation on grievances helped to institutionalize a victim model that, today, is being carbon-copied by a watershed of identity groups, and exploited by foreign actors as a kind of “useful idiot” to undermine America’s moral authority from within.
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The lesson of Jackson’s legacy?

In the real world of cause and effect, symbolism and showmanship do not solve problems. Solving problems solves problems – of which, sadly, Jackson never quite measured up.