The Rev. Jesse L. Jackson Sr. visits with guests at the National Bar Association's annual convention on July 31, 2025 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
COLUMBIA — The body of the Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. will lie in honor in the South Carolina Statehouse next week.
At the request of the Jackson family, members of the public will be able to pay their respects to the civil rights icon and two-time Democratic presidential hopeful on March 2.
A ‘servant leader’ honored: The nation pays tribute to Jesse Jackson, civil rights icon
Gov. Henry McMaster directed flags atop the Statehouse be lowered to half-staff from sunrise to sunset that same day, the governor’s office announced Monday.
Officials will provide more details later, according to the release.
Jackson died on Feb. 17 at his home in Chicago. He was 84.
A Greenville native, Jackson’s early leadership in the Civil Rights Movement included a peaceful protest at the whites-only public library in Greenville in July 1960 while he was home from college. The student group, called the Greenville Eight, helped force the integration of the public library just two months later.
Jackson’s death came months after he was hospitalized for treatment of a rare neurological disorder called progressive supranuclear palsy, according to multiple news reports last November.
Legislators in both the House and Senate held a moment of silence on Feb. 17 in Jackson’s honor.
State Sen. Karl Allen, a Greenville Democrat who was among those the family addressed their request to, had this to say about Jackson the day he died: “There are so many little boys and little girls in South Carolina who can look in the mirror now and say, ‘I am somebody!’ because of this native son.”
Last week, the family’s request that Jackson’s body lie in honor in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol was denied. The office of House Speaker Mike Johnson cited past precedent in the decision, The Associated Press reported.
The last person to lie in state at the Statehouse was former governor and U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollings following his death in April 2019 at age 97. The Charleston County Democrat retired from Washington, D.C., in 2005 after more than 38 years in the U.S. Senate.
Jackson will be only the second Black South Carolinian ever honored with a viewing at the Statehouse since its 1903 completion.
The first was state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, whose open coffin was on display in June 2015. Pinckney, the pastor of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, was among the nine victims gunned down by an avowed white supremacist following a Wednesday night Bible study.
During the viewing, a black drape covered the lobby’s window to block the view of the Confederate flag that still flew on a 30-foot pole on the Statehouse’s front lawn. Within weeks, the Legislature voted to permanently remove the flag and pole from Statehouse grounds.
Jackson family letterCourtesy of South Carolina Daily Gazette
