Bill Sutherland, Pan African Pacifist, 1918-2010
By Esi Sutherland-Addy, Ralph Sutherland, Amowi Sutherland Phillips, and Matt Meyer
Toward Freedom
January 7, 2010
http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/1817/1/
Bill Sutherland, unofficial ambassador between the
peoples of Africa and the
years, died peacefully on the evening of January 2,
2010. He was 91.
A life-long pacifist and liberation advocate,
Sutherland became involved in civil rights and anti-war
activities as a youthful member of the Student
Christian Movement in the 1930s. Sutherland was raised
in
youngest brother to Reiter Sutherland and to Muriel
Sutherland Snowden of Boston, who founded Freedom House
in 1949 and was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship "genius"
grant. He spent four years at Lewisburg Federal
Correctional Facility in the 1940s as a conscientious
objector to World War Two, striking up what became
life-long friendships with fellow C.O.s Ralph DiGia,
Bayard Rustin, George Houser, Dave Dellinger, and
others. In 1951, in the early days of the Cold War,
Sutherland, DiGia, Dellinger, and Quaker pacifist Art
Emory constituted the Peacemaker bicycle project, which
took the message of nuclear disarmament to both sides
of the Iron Curtain.
In 1953, in coordination with the War Resisters
International and with several activist groups and
independence movement parties on the continent, he
moved to what was then known as the Gold Coast. An
active supporter of Kwame Nkrumah, he married
playwright and Pan African cultural activist Efua
Theodora, and became the headmaster of a rural
secondary school. The call of Pan Africanist politics
was very strong, and Sutherland was instrumental-along
with a small group of African Americans living in
at the time, including dentists Robert and Sara Lee-in
hosting the visit of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
and Coretta Scott King to the 1957 independence
celebrations. In the early days of the first Ghanaian
government, Sutherland also served on the organizing
team of the All African Peoples Congress. He was
appointed private secretary to Finance Minister Komla
Gbedema. He was also central to the development of the
Sahara Protest Team, which brought together African,
European, and
the way of nuclear testing in the
Sutherland left
and
International, and for the Israeli labor organization
Histadrut. It was also in this period that he began a
friendship with Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan of the
Ismaili community, working in support of displaced
persons as Sadruddin became United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees. He settled in
Tanzania in 1963, as a civil servant. Sutherland's
chief work in Dar involved support for the burgeoning
independent governments and liberation movements. A
close friend and associate of
and
the Pan African Freedom Movement of East and Central
the Sixth Pan African Congress-held in Dar in
1974-working with C.L.R. James and other long-time
colleagues to bridge the gap between Africans on the
continent and in the Diaspora. He hosted countless
individuals and delegations from the
years, including assisting Malcolm X in what would be
his last trip to
camping ground for liberation leaders in exile from
throughout the region. His love of music, especially
jazz, his passion for tennis (which he played well into
his 80s), and the pleasure he got from dancing, were
hallmarks of his interactions, shared with political
associates and personal friends the world over.
Despite Sutherland's close association with those
engaged in armed struggle, he maintained his
connections with and commitment to revolutionary
nonviolence, and joined the international staff of the
Quaker-based American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
in 1974. As the AFSC pushed for the Nobel Peace Prize
to be awarded to South African anti-apartheid clergyman
Bishop Desmond Tutu, Sutherland was working as the AFSC
international representative. In 2003, the AFSC
initiated an annual Bill Sutherland Institute, training
and educational techniques. Sutherland was also the
recipient of an honorary doctorate degree from Bates
College, and served as a Fellow at
citation from the Gandhi Peace Foundation in
and, in 2009, received the War Resisters League's Grace
Paley Lifetime Achievement Award.
In 2000,
and Gandhi in
Nonviolence, Armed Struggle, and Liberation, co-
authored by Matt Meyer. Archbishop Tutu, who wrote the
foreword for the book, commented that "Sutherland and
Meyer have looked beyond the short-term strategies and
tactics which too often divide progressive people . . .
They have begun to develop a language which looks at
the roots of our humanness." On the occasion of
Sutherland's 90th birthday last year, Tutu called in a
special message, noting that "the people of
Bill Sutherland a big thank you for his tireless support."
Bill Sutherland is survived by three children-Esi
Sutherland-Addy, Ralph Sutherland, and Amowi Sutherland
Phillips-as well as grandchildren in
scores of family members, friends, and loved ones, he
will be missed by his niece, Gail Snowden, his loving
partner Marilyn Meyer, and his "adopted" sons Matt
Meyer and john powell. There will be a private funeral
for family members this week, and memorial services
will be organized for later this year.
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