Former University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill, revolutionary activist and ardent advocate for indigenous freedom has passed away at 78.
Churchill died Tuesday in Atlanta of complications from a stroke, his longtime friend and former attorney David Lane said Wednesday.
Churchill was born on Oct. 2, 1947, in Urbana, Illinois, to Jack LeRoy Churchill and Maralyn Lucretia Allen.
He was drafted into the U.S. Army at 19 years old and served a 10-month tour in South Vietnam, according to the AAUP. It was an experience Lane said helped shape his political views and advocacy for Indigenous people.
Churchill soon became involved in political activism back home, and went on to earn a master’s degree in cross-cultural communication from the University of Illinois-Springfield.
He briefly taught studio art and art history at Black Hills State College in South Dakota before moving to Colorado, where he started working for CU Boulder in 1978.
Churchill had an extensive and important writing career, penning several prominent revolutionary texts.
He wrote, “Agents of Repression: The FBI’s Secret Wars Against the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement.” The text meticulously detailed the US war against these two iconic organizations.
He followed up with “The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI’s Secret War Against Domestic Dissent,” which covered on a similar theme.
He later published, “Struggle for the Land: Native North American Resistance to Genocide, Ecocide and Colonization,” and “From a Native Son: Selected Essays on Indigenism.”
Churchill’s “Pacifism as Pathology: Reflections on the Role of Armed Struggle in North America,” was a clinical dissection of the role pacifism has had on the left in the imperial core. Almost twenty years later the text is still relevant and widely distributed.
His essay, “On the Justice of Roosting Chickens” was later converted into a book. This essay became the most famous in his career. He famously referred to the technocrats in the World Trade Center on 9/11 as “little Eichmanns” who were complicit in the evil of “America’s global financial empire.”
While clearly an accurate sentiment the statement eventually got widespread attention and led to him being fired from his university job.
After the controversy Churchill kept a lower profile but remained active in the left. His passing will leave a deep hole in the movement.