Citing security issues, Hamilton College in upstate New York canceled a speech featuring a controversial professor who is active on Indian issues.

The college received death threats against Ward Churchill, a professor at the University of Colorado, and against other officials. The speech was to take place tomorrow night.

Churchill was originally scheduled to talk about Indian issues but after an obscure September 2001 essay he wrote that linked the victims of the terrorist attacks to Nazis was discovered, focus shifted there. In response to the controversy, he resigned his post as chair of the CU-Boulder ethnic studies department in response and is facing calls to step down from the faculty.

Churchill is outspoken on Indian issues but his heritage is in doubt. According to various reports, he has alternately claimed Cherokee, Creek and Metis ancestry but lacks membership in a federally recognized tribe. He was once considered an honorary member of the United Keetoowah Band of Oklahoma but the tribe is said to have revoked the designation.

Churchill was once active within the American Indian Movement but its leaders call him a fraud and a government plant.

Get the Story:
College Cancels Speech by Professor Who Disparaged 9/11 Attack Victims (The New York Times 2/2)
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Churchill, the man, an enigma (The Denver Rocky Mountain News 2/2)
Letters on Churchill Controversy (The Denver Post 2/2)
N.Y. college cancels Churchill's appearance amid death threat (AP 2/1)
Text of Owens' letter on Churchill (The Denver Post 2/1)
Text of Churchill statement (The Denver Post 2/1)

Read the Essay:
"Some People Push Back" On the Justice of Roosting Chickens (Pockets of Resistance September 2001)

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