The Rev. Jesse Jackson, a Baptist minister, two-time U.S. presidential candidate and vigorous civil rights leader, has died at the age of 84, his family said.

"Our father was a servant leader - not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked," they say.

In the 1960s, Jackson fought for civil rights alongside Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., also a Baptist minister whose daughter remembers Jackson as as a "gifted negotiator," the BBC reported.

Jackson was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 2017 and was hospitalised for observation last November after being diagnosed with a degenerative condition.

Civil rights leader Rev. Al Sharpton said in a statement that "our nation lost one of its greatest moral voices" and paid tribute to a man who "carried history in his footsteps and hope in his voice."

"Reverend Jackson stood wherever dignity was under attack, from apartheid abroad to injustice at home. His voice echoed in boardrooms and in jail cells," Sharpton said, according to NBC News.

Jesse Jackson lobbied Pope John Paul II and the Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev to rebuke South Africa's apartheid government, The New York Times reported.

        - DIVESTMENT FROM APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA

He called on Harvard University to divest from the country. He was there when Nelson Mandela was released from Robben Island in 1990 after 27 years as a political prisoner.

Born Jesse Louis Burns in Greenville, South Carolina, in 1941, Jackson's mother was a 16-year-old high school student and his father a 33-year-old married man who lived next door.

His mother later married another man who adopted him, Sky News reported.

He grew up in the Jim Crow era, the often brutally enforced set of racist laws to subjugate black Americans in the South, and was segregated from white neighbours.

Jackson earned a football scholarship at the University of Illinois, but transferred to a historically black college because he said he experienced discrimination.

His civil rights activism began while he was a student, and he was once arrested for attempting to enter a "whites-only" public library.

Jackson was ordained as a Baptist minister in 1968, and his activism was noticed by Martin Luther King Jr. He became his protege.

He was there at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on the day King was assassinated, and claimed to have worn a shirt said to be soaked with the murdered civil rights leader's blood the following day, according to Sky News.

Jackson's work as an organizer began with the Congress of Racial Equality, participating in marches and sit-ins.

He attended North Carolina A&T State University and graduated with a degree in sociology.

He began rallying student support for King during his divinity studies at Chicago Theological Seminary and participated in the 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery march in Alabama.

Shortly afterwards, Jackson joined the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, or SCLC, to work alongside King full-time.

In 2000, he formally completed his Master of Divinity degree at the Chicago Theological Seminary, closing an academic chapter that had begun decades earlier.

 He drew praise from King as a young man running the SCLC's economic development and empowerment program, Operation Breadbasket — "we knew he was going to do a good job, but he's done better than a good job," King said.

Former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama paid tribute to the Rev. Jesse Jackson in a statement today, saying he "helped lead some of the most significant movements for change in human history."

The Obamas also emphasized that Jackson "created opportunities for generations of African Americans and inspired countless more, including us." They pointed to Jackson's runs for president, saying that he "laid the foundation" for the former president's successful campaign.

"Michelle and I will always be grateful for Jesse's lifetime of service, and the friendship our families share," the statement said. "We stood on his shoulders."

Former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama paid tribute to Jackson in a statement, saying he "helped lead some of the most significant movements for change in human history."

The Obamas also emphasized that Jackson "created opportunities for generations of African Americans and inspired countless more, including us." They pointed to Jackson's runs for president, saying that he "laid the foundation" for the former president's successful campaign.

"Michelle and I will always be grateful for Jesse's lifetime of service, and the friendship our families share," the statement said. "We stood on his shoulders."

Tributes poured in for Jackson from across the political spectrum.

US. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a Democrat, in a post to X called Jackson "a legendary voice for the voiceless."

Former President Joe Biden said that Jackson would be remembered as "a man of God and of the people" who "believed in his bones the promise of America: that we are all created equal in the image of God and deserve to be treated equally throughout our lives."

In a joint statement, former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Jackson "never stopped working for a better America with brighter tomorrows."

President Donald Trump said in a post to Truth Social that Jackson "was a good man, with lots of personality, grit, and 'street smarts.'"

"He loved his family greatly, and to them I send my deepest sympathies and condolences," Trump said in the post. "Jesse will be missed!"

In recent decades, Jackson was outspoken about leading politicians, including reported criticism about Obama.

He also condemned Trump's presidency, saying, "Fifty years of civil rights have been threatened."

His family said in their statement on the reverend's passing that public observances will be held in Chicago. The South Carolina native moved to Chicago in the 1960s where he attended seminary and later worked for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Southern Christian Leadership Conference, becoming a pivotal figure in the city's civil rights movement.