I’ve reached an age where I’m watching the generation of people who shaped me disappear. Through their examples, they gave me my values and my love of small towns and rural areas. They also built the North Carolina where I grew up. As they leave, they take with them a way of life that sustained generations of families.
Tuesday, Elvin Jackson passed away. In my circle of political people today, most know his son Morgan, one of the architects of Roy Cooper’s victory last November. Among my parent’s generation, those political people knew Elvin.
I can’t say I knew Elvin well, but I can say I knew him a long time and we shared a history and understanding of a certain part of North Carolina. Elvin was Congressman Bill Hefner’s man in the rural 8th Congressional District—the same District where I grew up, where my father served as a judge and where my uncle served in the General Assembly. Elvin and his generation of political leaders and operatives were committed to helping the people of small towns survive and thrive.
They came of age when President Kennedy told them “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.” They believed that our government could be a positive force in society. It took government to desegregate our schools and steer a new and fairer social structure in the South, but it took people like Elvin, Hefner, Jim Hunt, my father and uncle, and Justice Henry Frye, who came from neighboring Richmond County, to guide the new construct with as little upheaval as possible.
They understood that government could provide the infrastructure that creates businesses and improves standards of living. They embraced an expanded safety net that eased the burden of crushing poverty that was, and is, too prevalent in rural parts of the state. They believed that government and industry could work together to build a middle class, lifting people out of poverty and providing opportunities to increase social mobility.
Elvin and his generation did the work to build the North Carolina that caught the attention of the nation. They balanced the needs of cities with those of small towns. They helped Charlotte become a banking center by reducing interstate banking regulations and they built the Research Triangle Park to bring high tech jobs into Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. At the same time, they connected farms to cities with better roads, and built water and sewer plants to attract businesses and protect our environment. They made a state that separated itself from the rest of the South and made it a destination for people and businesses from around the world.
Elvin represents a generation of political leaders and operatives who had a broad vision of what the future could be. It was inclusive and optimistic. They believed that opportunity could abound while poverty could diminish. With the right tools and institutions, people could create better lives for their families and build stronger communities. They wanted to make the state and nation better for the next generation, not just their own.
We built the state we have today because of the lifetime commitment from people like Elvin. We could use a lot more of those people again. RIP Elvin Jackson and thanks for your service.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Most eloquently stated, Thomas Mills! What a fitting tribute to our dear Elvin Jackson, even though, as we know he would have been a bit embarrassed and greatly humbled by your gracious words. Our generation suffers from the lack of leaders like Elvin, but we are grateful for those who learned “at the feet of the masters” like you, Elvin’s wonderful son Morgan, and a select few others who work in the background, tirelessly fighting for those ideals and truths that we hold dear. Our State and our world is a better place because of men like Elvin Jackson who were not afraid to stand up for the things they believed were right for all our people, and never just talked “a good game,” but made change happen!
I have a heart that is full of sorrow with the passing of Elvin Jackson. It has been my pleasure to have know him for almost 60 years.
Elvin was from the generation that believed we must do good for the state. Never did he put his own interest first. He worked all of his life to make tomorrow better than today for all whose lives he touched. He reared two splendid sons who works reflect their fine heritage.
My deepest sympathy to his family and his multitude of friends.
Thank you, Thomas, for your wonderful tribute about Elvin Jackson. He was a great Democrat and an even better human being.
As I native Tar Heel and an adopted Virginian, thank you, Mr. Mills, for a eloquent words about a worthy life whose legacy will continue to give. it was a joy to read these words.
Well said! I could write the same sort of thing about Clyde Lucas and Russell Walker from Randolph County, both of whom were Hunt keys back in the day, and both of whom grew up in rural North Carolina communities and knew first hand what “subsistence farming” was all about. Their values were that everyone pitched in when and where needed, and that the larger community, whether church, grange, volunteer fire department or political party, had a responsibility to look after the less fortunate. The 21st century carpetbaggers who engineered the hostile takeover of our state legislature and local governments have no clue about the North Carolina values that made us different, and better, than other Southern states. As you say, we expected industry to partner with government to raise up the mass of people. Gov. R. Gregg Cherry said it well- “Good-thinking, growing, forward-looking companies… working hard with alert civic bodies, will remodel the industrial map of our glorious state in wonderfully helpful ways, bit by bit, month by month, year by year. Here in North Carolina, we have our own working problems, our own enthusiasms our own wholesale pride. Our job to do is our own garden to tend- in accordance with the local climate, the local rain, the local sunshine. We have, in the final analysis, a North Carolina way of doing things, and things, and this is in direct contrast to the vast and regimented industrial complexes of other lands.” (Nov. 22, 1946- Gov. Papers, p. 554) What’s missing today is the inspiration that generation had about a workable balance between private interests and the common good, enforced by wise government.
Amen! Great tribute to Elvin Jackson and his generation. We should all pay heed and honor them all.