Ward Churchill battle/Academic Freedom Update

This is an update on the Ward Churchill Firing this bodes poorly for academic freedom in this country for tenured professors. He is filing suit against UC Boulder and so it's not over 'til it's over. -Angela

July 26, 2007: On Ward Churchill Firing

Five pieces in this email:
1) Call for Op-eds and letters to the editor from
National Project to Defend Dissent & Critical Thinking
in Academia
2) Report from Daniel Kim, Assistant Professor,
Department of English, University of Colorado
3) Message of thanks to supporters from Natsu Saitta
and Ward Churchill
4) Transcript of coverage from Democracy Now!
5) Beneath the Surface interview with Tom Mayer and

Ward Churchill
_______________________________________________

>The outrageous decision to fire Ward Churchill comes
>on the heels of the denial of tenure to Norman
>Finkelstein by the administration at DePaul. Taken
>together, it is clear that “purge” is not too strong a
>term to describe what we are witnessing against
>dissenting and critical thinking scholars in academia
>today, and in particular those whose work challenges
>the “official narratives” about this country’s history
>and international policy that powerful forces in this
>society are determined to maintain and restore. What
>is called for at this moment is to seize the
>opportunity to bring forward as significant a response
>as possible. One way to do this is in the form of Op
>Ed pieces and letters to editors. These could register
>a significant, even unexpected, response that signals
>to faculty, scholars, students and the broader public
>that this decision represents a danger, not just to
>academia but to society at this time in history, that
>cannot and will not be allowed to stand. Most of the
>media coverage of the decision gives no hint of the
>growing opposition to this attack on critical thinking
>and dissent among this country’s faculty, scholars and
>public intellectuals expressed in the Open Letter that
>we published in the NYRB in April; by the powerful
>statements sent to the Regents and to the April
>Emergency Forum that have appeared at the
>wardchurchill.org and defendcriticalthinking.org,
>sites; the articles at Counterpunch,
>Insidehighered.org and many, many more.
>
>Please forward any op-eds and letters you write
>(published or not) to criticalxthinking.

_______________________________________

>Dear Friends, Comrades and Allies,
>
>On Tuesday, after two and a half years of struggle,
>the Univ of Colorado fired our colleague Prof Ward
>Churchill, one of the most prominent scholars in
>American Indian Studies, whose distinguished work over
>the past 25 years has deeply exposed COINTELPRO and
>the history of American Indian genocide.
>
>There has been a lot of media coverage but little that
>reflects what is truly at stake in the case. We, the
>faculty, staff and students who have been fighting on
>the ground here in Boulder, held our own joint press
>conference with Prof. Churchill and his attorney to
>respond to the firing. Our voices and analysis have
>not been represented in the coverage.
>
>I don't know how long this video will be available on
>the web, but here it is from a local TV station
>
>
>
>Our speakers are:
>
>Prof. Emma Perez of Ethnic Studies
>Prof. Margaret LeCompte of Education
>Prof. Tom Mayer of Sociology
>Hadley Brown, UCSU Tri-Exec, Student
>Ann-erika White Bird, Students for True Academic
>Freedom, Student
>
>You can also see Ward and his attorney, David lane,
>speaking at our joint press conference.

>The ramifications for academic freedom are clear to
>most but one important point that our speakers are
>addressing needs special emphasis. A key part of the
>"academic" case used to fire Prof. Churchill is that
>he supposedly "falsified" and "fabricated" the history
>of indigenous genocide--namely, that he lied when
>asserting that the US Army intentionally spread
>disease (e.g. via blankets), and that he lied when
>asserting that the US Government created the "eugenics
>code" of blood quantum (in the Dawes Act). The Right
>is crowing about how these "lies" about the US
>responsibility for indigenous genocide have been
>confirmed by Tuesday's firing. This firing is, as
>ACTA has declared, D-Day for a war on Ethnic Studies,
>Women's Studies, and every other scholarly institution
>of critical thinking that was carved into the
>University by the social movements of the 60s and 70s.
>
>You can also find links to the press conf by the
>neocon CU President Hank Brown and Regents' Chair Pay
>Hayes at the 9News page

>One of the better local newspaper articles from that
day is here.
>
>Finally, there is no way to thank you enough for your
>support from across the country and beyond. It has
>been a hard and uphill road and we know that so many
>of you have been with us from the beginning over two
>years ago. Because we have faced so much isolation,
>hostility and betrayal here in Boulder, your
>solidarity, your letters, your funds, your research,
>your organizing have been so crucial to the survival
>and persistence of our work in Boulder. We are glad
>and proud to know you'll be with us as the struggle
>moves ahead.
>
>In solidarity,
>Daniel Kim, on behalf of the faculty, students and
>staff at CU-Boulder fighting at "ground zero" Boulder
>
>Assistant Professor,
>Department of English,
>University of Colorado
>
>____________________________________
>
>
>Dear Friends,
>
>Thanks to all of you for your continuing support and
>recent e-mails. We are energized and encouraged to
>see how many people realize that yesterday's 8-to-1
>decision of the University of Colorado Regents to fire
>Ward Churchill was not about a few footnotes, but
>instead about suppressing historical truths and
>dissenting speech. (For a fairly good recap, see
www.democracynow.org ;
>there will be updates at wardchurchill.net.

>Some have said it was a sad day for academic freedom.
>It is sad when Cindy Carlisle becomes the lone
>courageous Regent for saying that the faculty review
>panel's recommendation shouldn't have been overridden
>by CU President Hank Brown. But did anyone really
>expect an elected body in Colorado to suddenly
>manifest backbone, when they had been instructed to
>fire Ward by Governors Owens and Ritter and the state
>legislature, and were under tremendous pressure from
>CU's big donors?
>
>For me, the bad days are when we sit by and let the
>attorney general intimidate us into a collective
>silence; when we allow torture, disappearances and
>arbitrary detentions to become routine; when we insist
>that this is a democracy, but refuse to accept any
>responsibility for the actions of the government.
>The sad days are when our kids are punished or
>humiliated in school for refusing to celebrate this
>country's genocidal history; when we get glimpses of
>other people's children being reduced to "collateral
>damage."
>
>In Ward's case, any pretense of academic freedom, to
>say nothing of due process, evaporated when the
>charade of a "research misconduct" investigation was
>allowed to proceed, with the apparent sanction of so
>many "liberal" academics like the National AAUP. It
>was long gone by last week, when CU refused to
>investigate the numerous charges of falsification and
>plagiarism in the very report upon which Ward's
>dismissal was based.
>
>Yesterday that charade was consummated and today our
>amazing attorney David Lane filed suit. We look
>forward to the day when a jury can decide whether the
>citizens of Colorado are as willing as the University
>to sacrifice the First Amendment for the status quo.
>
>Ward and I appreciate your support in this small piece
>of the struggle to keep critical thinking alive, and
>look forward to working with you on this and many
>other fronts.
>
> Natsu & Ward, July 25, 2007
>
>
>_________________________________________________
>
>Democracy Now!
>Wednesday, July 25th, 2007
>Professor Ward Churchill Vows to Sue University of
>Colorado Over Controversial Firing
>
>The Board of Regents of the University of Colorado in
>Boulder voted 8-to-1 Tuesday evening to fire tenured
>professor of Ethnic Studies Ward Churchill on charges
>of research misconduct. But Churchill maintains that
>the allegations were a pretext to remove him for his
>controversial political views. One day after his
>firing, Churchill calls the charges a sham and vows a
>suit against the school. [includes rush transcript]
>
>The Board of Regents of the University of Colorado in
>Boulder voted 8-to-1 Tuesday evening to fire tenured
>professor of Ethnic Studies Ward Churchill on charges
>of research misconduct. But Churchill maintains that
>the allegations were a pretext to remove him for his
>unpopular political views. Churchill has written a
>number of books on genocide against Native Americans
>and the US government's COINTELPRO program. After
>yesterday's verdict Churchill said he planned to sue
>the university.
>
>Churchill has written a number of books on genocide
>against Native Americans and the US government's
>COINTELPRO program. After yesterday's verdict
>Churchill said he planned to sue the university.
>
>The controversy dates back to early 2005 when a
>college newspaper reprinted Churchill's three-year old
>essay on the attacks on the World Trade Center. He
>described the attacks as a response to a long history
>of US abuses and called those who were killed on 9-11
>as "little Eichmanns" who formed a “technocratic corps
>at the very heart of America’s global financial
>empire."
>
>Adolf Eichmann was a Nazi bureacrat convicted for war
>crimes who political theorist Hannah Arendt famously
>described as embodying the "banality of evil." Fox
>News commentator Bill O’Reilly repeatedly attacked
>Churchill for his comparison. Soon after, Colorado
>Governor Bill Owens wrote a letter to the university
>calling for Churchill’s resignation.
>
>A special panel at the university immediately
>conducted an investigation into Churchill’s comments.
>They concluded that he could not be fired for his
>statements, which were protected by the First
>Amendment. However, another panel later determined
>that Churchill plagiarized and fabricated material in
>his scholarship and recommended his dismissal.
>
>Supporters of Ward Churchill organized a rally before
>the Regents delivered their decision to fire Churchill
>at 5.30 pm. They had been deliberating behind closed
>doors all day.
> • Churchill supporter Ann Erika Whitebird.
>Ward Churchill joins us on the phone from Boulder,
>Colorado.
>
> • Ward Churchill. He was just terminated from his
>tenured post as Professor of Ethnic Studies at the
>University of Colorado, Boulder. Churchill is an
>activist and author of a number of books on genocide
>against Native Americans and the US government's
>COINTELPRO program.
>
>RUSH TRANSCRIPT
>This transcript is available free of charge. However,
>donations help us provide closed captioning for the
>deaf and hard of hearing on our TV broadcast. Thank
>you for your generous contribution. ?Donate - $25,
>$50, $100, more...
>
>AMY GOODMAN: The Board of Regents of the University of
>Colorado in Boulder voted 8-to-1 Tuesday evening to
>fire tenured professor of ethnic studies Ward
>Churchill on charges of research misconduct, they
>said. But Professor Churchill maintains the
>allegations were a pretext to remove him for his
>unpopular political views.
>Churchill has written a number of books on genocide
>against Native Americans and the US government's
>COINTELPRO program -- that’s Counter-Intelligence
>Program. After yesterday's verdict, Churchill said he
>planned to sue the university.
>
>JUAN GONZALEZ: The controversy dates back to early
>2005, when a college newspaper reprinted Churchill's
>three-year-old essay on the attacks on the World Trade
>Center. He described the attacks as a response to a
>long history of US abuses and called those who were
>killed on 9/11 as “little Eichmanns” who formed a
>“technocratic corps at the very heart of America’s
>global financial empire.”
>
>Adolf Eichmann was a Nazi bureaucrat convicted for war
>crimes, who political theorist Hannah Arendt famously
>described as embodying the “banality of evil.” Fox
>News commentator Bill O'Reilly repeatedly attacked
>Churchill for his comparison. Soon after, Colorado
>Governor Bill Owens wrote a letter to the university
>calling for Churchill's resignation.
>
>A special panel at the university immediately
>conducted an investigation into Churchill’s comments.
>They concluded that he could not be fired for his
>statements, which were protected by the First
>Amendment. However, another panel later determined
>that Churchill plagiarized and fabricated material in
>his scholarship and recommended his dismissal.
>
>AMY GOODMAN: Supporters of Ward Churchill organized a
>rally before the Regents delivered their decision to
>fire Churchill at 5:30 last night in Boulder. They had
>been deliberating behind closed doors all day.
>Today we'll be joined by Ward Churchill on the phone
>from Boulder, but first to a clip of yesterday's
>rally. We turn now to Ward Churchill, his lawyer David
>Lane, American Indian Movement activist Glenn Morris,
>and one of Churchill's students.
>
> • ANN ERIKA WHITEBIRD: And the decision to fire Ward
>Churchill is really sad for me. He's the only
>professor that I’ve taken a class, where I really felt
>empowered as an Indigenous person. And our history,
>the history of genocide against our people, the
>history, the policy, the US policy of extermination
>against our people, the forced sterilization of our
>women -- that was found out as early as the ’70s -- it
>was all something that Ward talks about in his books.
>So I’m not just talking about the class that he’s
>offered, the FBI at Pine Ridge, but, you know, other
>classes that he teaches and then the books that he's
>written is really affirming as a Native person.
>
> • The history that we hear growing up about the
>smallpox blankets, it's not something that you
>question. It's something that is part of our oral
>history. And it's part of the history of other
>indigenous peoples. So when I’m here at CU Boulder and
>I talk to other students who are Dene or from other
>nations, it's a common understanding.
>
>AMY GOODMAN: That was a student talking about Ward
>Churchill. Now, we turn to the ethnic studies
>professor, who joins us on the phone from his home in
>Boulder. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Ward Churchill.
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: Thank you.
>
>AMY GOODMAN: Your thoughts today on the morning after
>your firing?
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: Well, a period of glaciation, which
>was this process of creating the illusion of research
>misconduct to cover a firing for political speech, has
>come to an end. That process has now run its course,
>so there's a new phase that's begun, which is, I
>suppose, for lack of a better way of putting it, my
>period of defensive posture has come to an end and the
>offense has begun, kicks off this morning with the
>filing of a suit.
>AMY GOODMAN: Who will you be suing?
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: Regents of the University of Colorado
>for accepting, in full knowledge at this point, a
>non-scholarly sham of an investigative report,
>creating the pretext. And I say “non-scholarly”
>because the university has withdrawn the entire
>investigative report from any scholarly scrutiny. They
>refuse to allow it to be subject to scrutiny by
>competent scholars. And there are research misconduct
>complaints in place at this point against the members
>of the investigative committee for serial plagiarism,
>wholesale falsification, outright fabrication -- in
>other words, fraud. It's a fraudulent finding.
>
>So there is no defensible scholarly conclusions that
>anything I’ve said in my writing is even inaccurate,
>much less fraudulent, or that I committed the
>so-called plagiarism. All they've got is public
>outrage in the form of very well-organized rightwing,
>active-style lobbying blocks, and the statements of
>public officials, and so on, saying I should be
>removed as the basis for removing me.
>
>JUAN GONZALEZ: The amazing thing about this is that
>the so-called -- the investigation focused on
>everything but the apparent reason why there was such
>a determination to investigate you. The essay having
>to do with 9/11, that wasn't even a subject,
>supposedly, of this investigation, was it?
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: No. And a point to be made there is
>that while I was a target, was a target that would
>serve as a sort of conduit, in a way, they considered
>me to be, and said so, considered me to be kind of at
>the forefront of a sort of critical line of analysis,
>historically speaking. And they wanted to roll back
>that line of analysis altogether, to discredit it, so
>that you basically have a return to that triumphalis,
>celebratory white-supremacist interpretation of
>American history with all of the denial and
>falsification that that is known to entail. That's the
>reason, in part. And it's in large part for the
>charade that they have acted out over the last
>two-and-a-half years, the going after the historical
>analysis, as well as a purveyor of it. And so, this
>goes way beyond me. I’m intended to symbolize the cost
>and consequence of challenging orthodoxy in certain
>critical domains, at least.
>
>JUAN GONZALEZ: And what has been the response of the
>press in Colorado? Have any of the newspapers or any
>of the press defended your right to speak your mind?
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: Well, yeah. They've created this false
>dichotomy, in a way: Well, it's reprehensible, we
>disagree with it, blah, blah, blah, but he had a right
>to say it, however repugnant it may have been. On the
>other hand, he did all these things that constitute
>research misconduct. Basically he's pedaling lies to
>the public that cause discontent with the status quo.
>And that's what the issue is. The specific acts of
>research misconduct has nothing to do with that
>speech.
>
>The press was instrumental in framing that. There's
>been a symbiotic relationship between the
>administration at the university and the press all
>along. The press really took the lead in drumming up
>furor. There were 400 feature articles on my case, or
>what is supposed to be my case, in the Denver metro
>area newspapers in barely sixty days. Pope died; I had
>the front page of the Rocky Mountain News. The Rocky
>Mountain News was at the very forefront of creating
>the appearance that there was scholarly impropriety
>involved in my work and to be able to separate that
>set of issues then, the scholarly impropriety from the
>speech issues.
>
>AMY GOODMAN: Ward Churchill, we have to go. But in
>addition to the lawsuit you're filing, what are your
>plans now?
>
>WARD CHURCHILL: Well, my plans now are to continue to
>do what it is that I’ve always done: I mean, being a
>professor at the University of Colorado hardly defines
>the nature of my life. In fact --
>
>AMY GOODMAN: We're going to have to leave it there. I
>want to thank you for being with us from Boulder, Ward
>Churchill, just fired by the University of Colorado.
>
>_____________________________________________
>
>Michael Slate, host of Beneath the Surface on KPFK,
>dedicated his show on Tuesday on Churchill. He
>interviewed Ward Churchill and Tom Mayer by phone, and
>played an excerpt from a ""Balance" Is The Wrong
>Criterion – And A Cover for a Witch-hunt – What We
>Need is the Search for the Truth: Education, Real
>Academic Freedom, Critical Thinking and Dissent by Bob
>Avakian, chairman of the Revolutionary Communist
>Party.
>
>Audio of the program can be listened to here:
>
>