[rockfan4]

According to the googles:

The word jay was used to describe someone who was an idiot, simpleton, or hick. The term jaywalk appeared when it was thought that people were stupid by walking across the road when it was unsafe to do. The word started being used in the early 1900s, with its first use in a 1909 issue of the Chicago Tribune. However, Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t cite an official use of the word until 1917, with an example of Bostonians using the word jaywalker. But it was also used in a 1915 New York Times article where the word had a more derogatory emphasis on it. This came from the fact that when jaywalker was first used, it was meant to describe poor people who had to walk because they couldn’t afford to drive. The wealthy upper class looked down on these people for being so stupid to just walk carelessly into traffic. If you were walking in traffic like an idiot, then you became known as a jaywalker.