Churchill backer not backing down

Sociologist Mayer vows to help raise money for lawsuit

Berny Morson, Rocky Mountain News

Published May 30, 2007 at midnight

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A University of Colorado sociology professor who has emerged as Ward Churchill's strongest supporter on campus said Tuesday he's not giving up yet.

CU President Hank Brown on Friday recommended firing Churchill, an ethnic studies professor accused of plagiarism and inventing material passed off as facts in his published works.

But Tom Mayer said he will continue to speak and write in defense of Churchill and will help raise funds to support a lawsuit if Churchill is dismissed.

"I'm interested not only in winning a court case but making people understand the injustice and how it's possible to take a person who's a pariah, and to find things to cover the fact that you're trying to get rid of a person you regard as a pain, and to find some kind of academic excuse for doing so," Mayer said.

Churchill's lawyer, David Lane, has said the misconduct charges against Churchill are a pretext to punish him for comments he made in an essay comparing 9/11 victims at the World Trade Center to Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann. He will argue that point in a lawsuit if Churchill is fired, Lane has said.

In calling for the firing, Brown said Churchill was not being singled out for his comments but rather for "severe" and "deliberate" research misconduct that "seriously impacts the university's academic reputation."

Mayer concedes that Churchill can be abrasive but calls him "a very important and creative scholar." Dismissing Churchill would be a blow to academic freedom, he said.

Mayer recognizes that few fellow faculty members share his views on Churchill. Only six joined him in signing an April 23 letter protesting an investigative report that upheld the misconduct charges against Churchill.

The investigative report was written by a faculty committee, not the CU administration.

RL Widmann, Faculty Council chairwoman, said she takes no position on whether Churchill should be fired and has no way of knowing where the majority of professors stand on the issue.

But, she said, the process by which Churchill is being judged is "absolutely" fair. Faculty who joined in the investigation are strongly protective of academic freedom, she said.

"I have not heard any complaints so far from faculty about the process that was set up for any grievance," Widmann said.

Brown made his recommendation in a letter to CU's Privilege and Tenure Committee, which mostly upheld the academic misconduct charges but favored suspension without pay for Churchill, rather than dismissal.

The panel now has 15 days to respond to Brown's decision. If Brown still believes Churchill should be fired, the matter goes to the CU Board of Regents.

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