Marc Morial, the president of the
National Urban League tells
theGrio, “[Vernon Jordan] had a behind-the-scenes influence.”
Jordan was one of the first Black Americans to sit on a corporate board in the ’70s and ’80s. He remained on those boards throughout the years and his seat at the table opened doors for Black CEOs like
Ken Chenault and
Former American Express CEO Ken Chenault and former Xerox CEO Ursula Burns (Photo: Getty Images)
As Morial points out, “The common denominator for both of those Black [CEOs] was that Vernon Jordon was a board member of both of those companies.”
Source: PGA TOUR Archive / Getty
Vernon Jordan, a notable civil rights activist and an adviser to
President Bill Clinton has died. The family said that Mr. Jordan passed away peacefully surrounded by family and loved ones.
Jordan was born August 15, 1935, in Atlanta, Ga., later graduating from Indiana’s DePauw University and the Howard University School of Law in Washington, D.C. In 1971, Jordan was the president of the National Urban League, a post he commanded for a decade.
The NUL’s State of Black America report was first initialized by Jordan in 1976 in response to President Gerald Ford’s State of the Union Address which Jordan and the NUL failed to speak to the concerns that Black Americans faced at the time. Jordan’s tenure with the NUL was productive, as it expanded national chapters and raised millions of dollars. The NUL also gave attention to voter registration drives and spoke to the concerns of police conduct within Black communities, issues that the organiza