The papers contain clippings (articles by and about Jackson), correspondence of both Esther and James Jackson, including the Jacksons' voluminous World War II correspondence with each other, James Jackson's lectures (typescripts and audiocassettes), research notebooks, speeches, and writings (published and unpublished), subject files, correspondence, internal documents and printed ephemera pertaining to the Southern Negro Youth Congress, and to Freedomways, legal and other materials pertaining to the Smith Act indictments of Jackson and other communists, Communist Party internal documents, many of a programmatic nature, and memorabilia and other biographical materials. Individuals represented in the collection include: Carl Bloice, Lloyd Brown, Dorothy and Louis Burnham, Angela Davis, Benjamin Davis, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Eugene and Peggy Dennis, Shirley Graham Du Bois, W.E.B. Du Bois, Martin Duberman, Viriginia Durr, William Z. Foster, Simon Gerson, Gus Hall, Ollie Harrington, Hosea Hudson, Alphaeus Hunton, Pablo Neruda, John Pittman, Pete Seeger, Edward Strong, Alice Walker, Mary Helen Washington, Jim West, Robert Williams, Henry Winston, and Carl Winter.

Series I. Biographical and Memorabilia, contains some genealogical and family history materials, including interview transcripts, documents relating to Jackson's army service, and honorary and identification documents.

Series II. Clippings, contains clippings by and about James Jackson, most from the 1960s-80s.

Series III. Communist Party USAcontains internal documents relating to conventions, Party programs, African Americans, the Party crisis of 1989-91, and other topics.

Series IV. Correspondencecontains James Jackson's correspondence, and some third party correspondence, and is divided into three subseries: alphabetical, chronological, and third party correspondence. Notable names include Carl Bloice ( Daily World), Benjamin Davis, Eugene and Peggy Dennis, W.E.B. Du Bois, Simon Gerson, Gus Hall, Ollie Harrington, Hosea Hudson, Pablo Neruda, John Pittman, Ed Strong, Henry Winston, and Carl Winter.

Series V. Correspondence, Army contains the almost daily letters exchanged between James and Esther in 1944-5 (and some earlier letters from 1943), correspondence with James E. Jackson Sr., and letters from Louis and Dorothy Burnham.

Series VI. Freedomways (Esther Cooper Jackson) contains editorial correspondence, files on a special issue devoted to Paul Robeson and the publication of Paul Robeson: The Great Forerunner, files on a centennial tribute to W.E.B. Du Bois, and files on financial issues. Notable correspondents include: John Conyers, Ruby Dee, Ralph Ellison, Shirley Graham Du Bois, Paul Robeson Jr., and Coleman Young.

Series VII. Esther Cooper Jackson Papers, contains her correspondence with African American progressives and correspondence with historians and other researchers, including Robeson biographer Martin Duberman, and writings, including her M.A. thesis Negro Women Domestic Workers in Relation to Trade Unionism. Notable correspondents include: Lloyd Brown, Dorothy and Margaret Ann Burnham, Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, Virginia Durr, Shirley Graham Du Bois, Pete Seeger, and Alice Walker.

Series VIII. Lectures, contains Jackson's typescripts for educational lectures delivered in Communist Party fora. Topics include Africa and African Americans, dialectical and historical materialism, Marxism-Leninism, Party history and organization, and political economy.

Series IX. Notebooks, contains 86 research and reading notebooks, most undated and untitled, but almost all post-1960. Three notebooks discuss Vietnam.

Series X. Smith Actcontains briefs, testimony and other legal documents relating to Jackson's indictment and trial, materials of the James Jackson Defense Committee, and clippings and correspondence.

Series XI. Southern Negro Youth Congress, contains correspondence of SNYC officials, letters from E.D. Nixon and Thurgood Marshall, circulars, constitutions, leaflets, flyers, a manual or organization, pamphlets, programs, reports, several issues of Cavalcade, "The Southern Hate Press: A Threat to Post-War Democracy" by Esther Cooper, later correspondence with academics, FBI FOIA files requested by Robin Kelley, and an interview with James Jackson.

Series XII. Speeches, contains texts of Jackson's speeches on a variety of topics given from 1946 to 2001.

Series XIII. Subject Filescontains a variety of published and unpublished documents, and is arranged alphabetically by event, title, or topic. About half the materials relate to African American politics and social conditions, with the remainder relating to a broad range of domestic and international affairs, and the international communist movement. Notable files include American DilemmaStudy Material, a Detroit Red Squad FOIA file, and five folders of photocopies of Ollie Harrington drawings and cartoons (the originals have been separated to the Library's non-print collection).

Series XIV. Writings, Publishedis divided into three subseries: Articles, Leaflets, and Pamphlets, The most frequent topics in this wide-ranging series are African American politics and social conditions, international communism and politics, and appreciations of or memorials for notable communists and progressives.

Series XV. Writings, Unpublishedare arranged alphabetically and cover African American leaders, politics and social conditions, the Communist Party, and other topics.

Series XVI. Writings by Others, contains published and unpublished articles by U.S. Communists and progressives, and by writers from the Soviet Union.

Series XVII: Audiocassettescontains 373 recordings (Oral Histories Collection number 57). Most contain lectures and speeches, often of an educational nature, given by Jackson, usually at Communist Party forums. There are also some thirty recordings of talks by other Party leaders, including Gus Hall and Henry Winston, a recording of an event celebrating Jackson's 60th birthday, and an interview with Jackson by his daughter, Kathy. The audiocassettes are housed separately in the Library's Oral History collection as Oral Histories Collection 57.

This collection is temporarily closed to researchers.