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Vernon Jordan, civil rights champion and 'first friend' to Bill Clinton, dies at 85

Sarah Elbeshbishi and Deborah Barfield Berry, USA TODAY
·7 min read
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Vernon Jordan, a civil rights activist and a former adviser to President Bill Clinton, died Monday, his family said. He was 85.

“My father passed away last night around 10p surrounded by loved ones, his wife and daughter by his side,” Vickee Jordan Adams, Jordan’s daughter, shared in a statement Tuesday to CBS News.

Before becoming a prominent adviser and aide to Clinton, Jordan had roles as with the NAACP, National Urban League and United Negro College Fund.

As president of the Urban League, he advocated for jobs and justice for Black Americans and against their modern struggles.

Jordan led the organization at a “crucial moment in history,” Marc Morial, the current Urban League president, said in a statement Tuesday. Jordan took the leadership role after the passage of several landmark pieces of legislation providing protections for Black Americans, including the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act. Morial said Jordan’s mission was to “empower Black Americans to realize the promise of these victories.”

President Bill Clinton receives some consoling advice from White House advisor and golf partner Vernon Jordan after Clinton hit a bad shot during their golf math at the Farm Neck Golf Club in Oak Bluffs, Mass., on Martha's Vineyard on Aug. 22, 1993.
President Bill Clinton receives some consoling advice from White House advisor and golf partner Vernon Jordan after Clinton hit a bad shot during their golf math at the Farm Neck Golf Club in Oak Bluffs, Mass., on Martha's Vineyard on Aug. 22, 1993.

In Jordan, the nation “has lost one of its greatest champions of racial and economic justice," Morial said. "He was a transformational leader who brought the movement into a new era. He was a personal mentor and dear friend. His passing leaves a tremendous void that can never be filled.”

Morial said Jordan first published the league’s annual “State of Black America’’ report in 1976, because President Gerald Ford didn’t include the conditions facing Black Americans, including poverty and civil rights concerns, in his State of the Union address.

“Vernon said, ‘I’ll publish my own,’’ Morial told USA TODAY.

The report continues to one of the organization’s signature documents. “It is the baseline on the disparities that exist in American life,’’ he said.

While president of the Urban League, Jordan nearly died after being shot by a white supremacist with a hunter's rifle in 1980, outside his Fort Wayne, Indiana, hotel. He had five surgeries and faced three months of recovery.

Still, Jordan told Ebony magazine after the shooting that he was not “afraid, and I won’t quit."

An influence on young activists

Morial first met Jordan when he was 16 years old and the civil rights activist visited his family’s home in New Orleans. He said Jordan made a lasting impression on him and his friends.

“He was authentically Black,’’ recalled Morial. “He was very well-dressed. He was cool, and he seemed to be so down to earth. Never would I have imagined at 16 that I would get an opportunity to stand on his shoulders.’’

Before that, much of what Morial knew about Jordan came from what he read about him in Jet magazine where Jordan was regularly featured. “He contributed so much to so many walks of life,’’ Morial said. “He contributed to politics and business and civil rights.”

Morial said he also admired how Jordan sponsored and mentored so many young professionals, some who would go on to head major organizations.

In 2015, Dorie Ladner, a veteran of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and Jordan were both speakers at a civil rights program hosted by the University of Pittsburgh. Ladner talked about voter suppression, but she said guests couldn’t wait to greet Jordan, the keynote speaker. The audience seemed to be spellbound.

“He spoke out about how far we’ve come,’’ Ladner, 72, recalled. But he also noted how much more needed to be done. “He talked about it in realistic terms… He was very plain-spoken.”

Ladner first met Jordan in the early 1960s when she and others worked to register Black residents to vote in Mississippi. Jordan worked for a group that helped fund a voter education project in Greenwood. The funding was key to keeping the effort going, Ladner said.

She remembered a tall handsome man, who had such a presence. “Some people don’t have to say anything. He was the type of person who could take charge,” she said. “He had all of the attributes of a leader.”

The Bill Clinton years

Jordan left the Urban League in 1982 and became a partner at Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer and Feld. Eventually he became a key campaign adviser to Clinton and co-chaired Clinton’s transition team, the first Black person in that role.

Jordan’s influence was rooted in his friendship with the former president, which started in the 1970s and turned into a partnership and political alliance. Clinton was still just a young politician from Arkansas when Jordan met him and bonded over their similar upbringings and Southern roots.

President-Elect Bill Clinton, left, meets with Vice President-elect Al Gore, center, and Vernon Jordan at the Governor's Mansion in Little Rock, Arkansas, Nov. 18, 1992. The group is working on Clinton's transition to the presidency. Jordan was the transition chairman.
President-Elect Bill Clinton, left, meets with Vice President-elect Al Gore, center, and Vernon Jordan at the Governor's Mansion in Little Rock, Arkansas, Nov. 18, 1992. The group is working on Clinton's transition to the presidency. Jordan was the transition chairman.

Jordan “never gave up on his friends or his country," Clinton said Tuesday.

“From his instrumental role in desegregating the University of Georgia in 1961, to his work with the NAACP, the Southern Regional Council, the Voter Education Project, the United Negro College Fund, and the National Urban League, to his successful career in law and business, Vernon Jordan brought his big brain and strong heart to everything and everybody he touched. And he made them better," Bill and Hillary Clinton said in a statement.

Former President Barack Obama said that “like so many others, Michelle and I benefited from Vernon Jordan’s wise counsel and warm friendship — and deeply admired his tireless fight for civil rights."

Congressman Sanford D. Bishop, Jr., D-Ga., said Jordan's "presence in corporate board rooms and on international platforms, as well as his advice and counsel to multiple Presidential administrations, truly made a positive difference. He did so much for so many for so long.”

Jordan's death comes months after the deaths of two other civil rights icons: U.S. Rep. John Lewis and C.T. Vivian.

After growing up in the Jim Crow South and living much of his life in a segregated America, Jordan took a strategic view of race issues.

“My view on all this business about race is never to get angry, no, but to get even,” Jordan said in a July 2000 New York Times interview. “You don’t take it out in anger; you take it out in achievement.”

Humble beginnings in Atlanta

Jordan was born in Atlanta on Aug. 15, 1935, to Vernon and Mary Belle Jordan and was their second out of three boys. Jordan lived with his family in public housing until he was 13 but was exposed to the city’s elite through his mother, who worked as a caterer for many of the city’s affluent citizens.

Jordan attended DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, where he one of five Black students. He graduated in 1957 with a bachelor’s degree in political science. Jordan then attended Howard University School of Law in Washington, where he met and married his first wife, Shirley Yarbrough.

Jordan spent two years at the Georgia field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, where he organized chapters, demonstrations and boycotts. He then moved to Arkansas to begin private practice, while also becoming the director of the Voter Education Project of the Southern Regional Council.

Civil rights activist Vernon Jordan has died at 85.
Civil rights activist Vernon Jordan has died at 85.

“Today, the world lost an influential figure in the fight for civil rights and American politics, Vernon Jordan. An icon to the world and a lifelong friend to the NAACP, his contribution to moving our society toward justice is unparalleled,” Derrick Johnson, NAACP president and CEO, said in a statement Tuesday.

While considering whether to run for Georgia’s 5th Congressional District seat in 1970s Jordan was picked to lead the United Negro College Fund, which he did for about a year. During his tenure, Jordan helped the organization fundraiser $10 million to provide support to students at historically Black colleges and universities.

“I believe that working with the Urban League, the NAACP, PUSH and SCLC is the highest form of service that you can perform for Black people,” Jordan said in a December 1980 interview in Ebony Magazine. “And if you serve Black people you serve the country as well. So if I do a good job here, the Black people are not the only beneficiary; so is the country. The country has a vested interest in Black people doing well.”

Contributing: Associated Press

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Vernon Jordan, civil rights activist and Bill Clinton adviser, dies

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