The Rev. Jesse Jackson said late Sunday that he was not offended by comments on Saturday by former President Bill Clinton, who brought up Mr. Jackson’s name in response to a question about Senator Barack Obama. Mr. Clinton had noted that Mr. Jackson had won South Carolina in the Democratic contests in 1984 and 1988. Pundits and many in the blogosphere interpreted Mr. Clinton’s mention of Mr. Jackson as an attempt to diminish Mr. Obama — and what would turn out to be his landslide victory Saturday in South Carolina over Senator Hillary Clinton — because Mr. Jackson had not gone on to win the Democratic nomination.But Mr. Jackson said he did not see it that way. “I don’t read anything negative into Clinton’s observation,” Mr. Jackson said in a phone conversation late Sunday night from India, where he is taking part in a commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
Still, Mr. Jackson said that he had spoken to Mr. Obama on Saturday night and to Mr. Clinton a few days earlier and that he had appealed to both to “take it to a higher ground.”
Mr. Jackson, the long-time civil rights activist, is supporting Mr. Obama while his wife, Jacqueline Jackson, is supporting Mrs. Clinton. Their son, Representative Jesse Jackson Jr., is supporting Mr. Obama.