Denver
AP
—
Ben Nighthorse Campbell, the previous senator and US consultant of Colorado recognized for his passionate advocacy of Native American points, died Tuesday. He was 92.
Campbell died of pure causes surrounded by his household, his daughter, Shanan Campbell, confirmed to The Associated Press.
Campbell, a Democrat who shocked his celebration by becoming a member of the Republican Party, stood out in Congress as a lot for his unconventional costume — cowboy boots, bolo ties and ponytail — as his protection of youngsters’s rights, organized labor and monetary conservatism.
A member of the Northern Cheyenne tribe, Campbell stated his ancestors had been amongst greater than 150 Native Americans, principally ladies, kids and aged males, killed by US troopers whereas camped underneath a flag of truce on November 29, 1864. He helped sponsor laws upgrading the Great Sand Dunes National Monument in southern Colorado, the place the bloodbath occurred, to a nationwide park.
He served three phrases within the House, beginning in 1987. He then served two phrases within the Senate, from 1993 to 2005.
“He was a master jeweler with a reputation far beyond the boundaries of Colorado,” stated Colorado Sen. John Hickenlooper on X. “I will not forget his acts of kindness. He will be sorely missed.”
The motorcycle-riding lawmaker and cattle rancher was thought-about a maverick even earlier than he abruptly switched to the Republican Party in March 1995, indignant with Democrats for killing a balanced-budget modification within the Senate. His swap outraged Democratic leaders and was thought-about a coup for the GOP.
“I get hammered from the extremes,” he stated shortly afterward. “I’m always willing to listen … but I just don’t think you can be all things to all people, no matter which party you’re in.”
Considered a shoo-in for a 3rd Senate time period, Campbell shocked supporters when he dropped out of the race in 2004 after a well being scare.
“I thought it was a heart attack. It wasn’t,” stated Campbell. “But when I was lying on that table in the hospital looking up at all those doctors’ faces, I decided then, ‘Do I really need to do this six more years after I’ve been gone so much from home?’ I have two children I didn’t get to see grow up, quite frankly.”
He retired to deal with the Native American jewellery that helped make him rich and was placed on show at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian. He additionally labored on a line of outside gear with a California-based firm, Kiva Designs, and have become a senior coverage adviser with the powerhouse legislation agency of Holland & Knight in Washington.
Campbell based Ben Nighthorse Consultants which targeted on federal coverage, together with Native American affairs and pure assets. The former senator additionally drove the Capitol Christmas Tree throughout the nation to Washington, DC, on a number of events.
“He was truly one of a kind, and I am thinking of his family in the wake of his loss,” stated Colorado Rep. Diana DeGette on X.
In 1982, he was planning to ship his jewellery to California, however unhealthy climate grounded his aircraft. He was killing time within the southern Colorado metropolis of Durango when he went to a county Democratic assembly and wound up giving a speech for a buddy operating for sheriff.
Democrats had been on the lookout for somebody to problem a GOP legislative candidate and sounded out Campbell in the course of the assembly. “Like a fish, I was hooked,” he stated.
His opponent, Don Whalen, was a preferred former faculty president who “looked like he was out of a Brooks Brothers catalog,” Campbell recalled. “I don’t think anybody gave me any kind of a chance. … I just think I expended a whole lot of energy to prove them wrong.”
Campbell hit the streets, ripping city maps out of the phone book and strolling door to door to speak with individuals. He recalled leaving a observe at a home in Cortez the place nobody was house when he heard a automotive roar into the driveway, gravel flying and brakes squealing.
The driver jumped out, tire iron in hand, and screamed that Campbell couldn’t have his furnishings. “Aren’t you the repossession company?” the person requested.
“And I said, ‘No man, I’m just running for office.’ We got to talking, and I think the guy voted for me.”
Campbell went on to win and he by no means misplaced an election thereafter, shifting from the Colorado House to the US House after which the Senate.
Born April 13, 1933, in Auburn, California, Campbell served within the Air Force in Korea from 1951 to 1953 and obtained a bachelor’s diploma from San Jose State University in 1957. He attended Meiji University in Tokyo from 1960 to 1964, was captain of the US judo group within the 1964 Olympics and received a gold medal within the Pan American Games.
Campbell as soon as known as then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt a “forked-tongued snake” for opposing a water undertaking close to the southern Colorado city of Ignacio, which Campbell promoted as a solution to honor the water rights of the Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute tribes.
He clashed with environmentalists on every thing from mining legislation and grazing reforms to setting apart land for nationwide monuments.
Despite all this — or maybe due to it — voters beloved him. In 1998, Campbell received reelection to the Senate by routing Democrat Dottie Lamm, the spouse of former Gov. Dick Lamm, regardless of his swap to the GOP. He was the one Native American within the Senate at the time.
He stated he was criticized as a Democrat for voting with Republicans, after which pilloried by some newspapers for his stances after the swap.
“It didn’t change me. I didn’t change my voting record. For instance, I had a sterling voting record as a Democrat on labor. I still do as a Republican. And on minorities and women’s issues,” he stated.
Campbell stated his values — liberal on social points, conservative on fiscal ones — had been formed by his life. Children’s causes had been pricey to him as a result of he and his sister hung out in an orphanage when his father was in jail and his mom had tuberculosis.
Organized labor received his backing as a result of hooking up with the Teamsters and studying to drive a truck acquired him out of the California tomato fields. His time as a Sacramento County sheriff’s deputy in California within the late Sixties and early ’70s made him a legislation enforcement advocate.
His resolution to retire from politics, Campbell stated, had nothing to do with allegations that Ginnie Kontnik, his former chief of workers, solicited kickbacks from one other staffer and that his workplace lobbied for a contract for a know-how firm with ties to the previous senator.
He referred each issues to the Senate Ethics Committee. In 2007, Kontnik pleaded responsible to a federal cost of not reporting $2,000 in earnings.
“I guess there was some disappointment” with these fees, Campbell stated. “But a lot of things happen in Washington that disappoint you. You just have to get over them because every day there’s a new crisis to deal with.”