Jackson Calls Off Ads for Schools Chain

After facing a barrage of questions from reporters in Los Angeles, the Rev. Jesse Jackson on Thursday called off a series of newspaper ads and television commercials that feature the Democratic presidential hopeful as the paid spokesman for a national chain of business and vocational schools.

When Jackson first arrived shortly after noon to celebrate his 46th birthday at a Hollywood fund-raising party, he seemed confident that the controversy over the ads was minor. He told reporters there was nothing improper about his agreeing to endorse the business schools, and promised to discuss the matter with his wife and attorney.

But by late afternoon, Jackson had reconsidered and his campaign staff in Washington released a statement announcing that Jackson would seek to have the advertising campaign dropped.

Little Early Interest

“In order to ensure that all campaign activities are not just correct but also appropriate, I have today asked my attorney to undertake cancellation of this contract,” Jackson said in the statement. “The issue of education is too important to me and to our nation to have it overshadowed by any controversy.”

The ad campaign for schools owned by Allied Education Corp. was first disclosed in Ad Week magazine Sept. 14, but the report did not generate any interest until the ads began to run this week in New York and California newspapers. Since then, the controversy has threatened to cloud Jackson’s formal declaration of candidacy scheduled for Saturday in Raleigh, N.C.

In the ads, which took his campaign staff and advisers by surprise, Jackson urges readers to enroll in the schools to better themselves and “be somebody,” a phrase Jackson has often used to inspire youth. Asked Thursday why he had kept his campaign staff in the dark, Jackson said it was not a matter of campaign policy and was consistent with other outside activities Jackson has pursued, such as consulting and a daily radio appearance.

Motivational Effort

Jackson Thursday described the advertisements as a way to motivate youngsters to stay in school and off drugs. He declined to say how much he was paid by the firm, which is based in Costa Mesa and operates 22 business and vocational schools in six states with about 5,000 students. In California, the company’s schools include the Barclay colleges and Barclay Career School in Los Angeles.

Roger N. Williams, director of operations for the schools, said the company was willing to withdraw the ads temporarily at Jackson’s request. But Williams said there would be “negotiations” with Jackson about the eventual fate of the advertising campaign.

Williams said the company had sought Jackson to be its first corporate spokesman because of his reputation as a speaker and motivator. The schools are mainly located in urban areas and have a predominantly minority enrollment, Williams added. “We expected to be noticed,” he said.

Although it is rare, perhaps unprecedented, for a presidential candidate to appear as a commercial spokesman for products, Jackson likened the ads and still-unreleased television commercials to the reruns of old Ronald Reagan movies that were shown on television during the last campaign.

Told that the airing of those movies led to complaints from other candidates and pressure on the television stations to provide equal time to them, Jackson said Thursday: “Well, I assume the same doctrine would apply in this situation. It would be perfectly all right with me. The fact is we intend to comply with the letter and the spirit of the law.”