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Rev. Jesse Jackson Challenges Mayors to End Poverty By Larry Jones In a rousing speech on June 11, Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, president and founder of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, challenged mayors to be bold leaders in addressing the needs of the poor and disadvantaged in their communities. At a time when our nation is experiencing unparalleled economic growth, Jackson reminded mayors that poverty is on the rise and many people are being left behind. He said, "citizens are crying out with unmet needs in the shift from budget deficits to budget surpluses." There are "pockets of hopelessness and alienation," he explained. In response Jackson said "we now have the resources to wipe out poverty rather than wipe out the poor." He told mayors, "I want to talk to you today about a call to action, a call to alarm, a call to hope and healing." Expressing disappointment, Jackson said "I am a bit uneasy today about a kind of quietness about this conference." He reminded mayors that "most of us got to where we are by acting. We must not retire on the job and cease to act and let e-mail become a substitute for action." He challenged them to engage the presidential candidates, Texas Governor George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore and to use their influence to help shape the debate for the November election. "Both of them will make news by telling you what they have to say. But what do you have to say to them? At least now they need you more than you need them," he said. Jackson said the challenge for cities in the upcoming election, is not the absence of charismatic leadership but the absence of commitment to systematic investment in sound priorities. He added that "if you walk into a room, Mr. Mayor, and it’s dark, you may have a zero deficit personality. But if you plug [a light] into the socket, it will draw fire because it touches something live. No matter what the personality of a candidate may be, if he or she touches something live, light will come on. Leaders must touch something that matters. In the year 2000 the issue that must drive us is the issue of abounding, growing poverty. It’s Appalachia. It’s the Mississippi Delta. It’s the Ozark. It’s not a black or brown issue. Whether white poverty or brown poverty, poverty hurts." Change Comes From People "In time past, the change that has come did not come from the top of the party down, did not come from the White House or Congress down. It came from people crying out, bottom up, using their democratic right to fight for the right," Jackson said. He cited a number of examples including, the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Topeka, Kansas Board of Education; the 1955 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama; the 1960 sit-ins; the 1964 protest in Atlantic City, New Jersey; and the public accommodations bill. He reminded mayors that not all people are sharing in the "American dream," which he defined as "one big tent" that includes "many races and faces from many places, many languages but one message–the message of inclusion." Jackson explained that "under that one big tent, there are five basic promises: (1) equal protection under the law; (2) equal access; (3) equal opportunity; (4) a fair share; (5) and concern for the least of these." He said today the dream is under attack. "There are those who are imploding the dream from within and attacking it from without," he said. "Those who dare to pursue the American dream of one big tent, must dare to mold opinion and not just follow the opinion poll." Jackson also expressed concerns about our criminal justice system which send a disproportionate share of minorities to prison. He cites an examples in Seattle, Washington, where African-Americans comprise four percent of the population but 25 percent of the jail population and in King County where they are five percent of the population and 36 percent of the inmates. Prisons Growth Industry "What’s driving this phenomenon called the jail industrial complex around the nation? This new growth industry for the emerging strongest union is the prison guard union. They put $500,000 in both gubernatorial candidates’ campaign in California. What’s this new phenomenon? In California when crime went down and the industry did not have enough contents, they lowered the age of children to be tried as adults. What’s driving this phenomenon? A combination of race profiling (by teachers, by police, by banks and judges); excessive charges for nonviolent drug offenses; inadequate, poorly served legal representation; and jails for profit." There are two extremes, Jackson explained. There are tremendous economic explosions at one end and growth of the jail industrial complex at the other end, "where welfare is down and poverty is up." Jackson said there is a structural crisis that is causing the growing gap between the surplus culture and the deficit culture, and the disparities in education, in sentencing and access to capital. A structural crisis deserves structural solutions. He said that equal protection under the law must be our rallying cry. "Mr. Bush and Mr. Gore must put forth solutions that correspond to the nature and the size of the problems. More capital punishment and less capital and less education will not make us more secure," he said. Jackson explained that there are one million unfilled high tech jobs in the nation due to the lack of a sufficient number of skilled workers. He pointed out that high tech companies are turning increasingly to foreign workers to fill these jobs. "Shall we fight for a million Americans to have the million jobs or shall there be a million foreigners because we have not put forth a formula to train a million Americans?" He said, "Mayors must go bold to get those million jobs." He also challenged mayors to work together to influence high tech companies to wire homes, churches and schools. "If AT&T, MCI have to come to your cities to do business, why can’t there be a core of fifty mayors from fifty cities to require them to wire every house and every church in our cities?" Urges Help On AIDS Before ending his speech, Jackson made a compassionate appeal to mayors to work with him to help increase public awareness of AIDS. He pointed out that many people are walking around with the virus and don’t know it. The number one cause of death among black and brown persons under the age of 44 is AIDS. In response to this problem, Jackson asked mayors to go back home and take the AIDS test and encourage people in their communities to do the same. The purpose of this effort is to detect and prevent the spread of AIDS.     
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