The great conservative civil rights icon Roy Innis has died at 82 from complications from Parkinson’s disease. 

Though not as known on the national scene as race-baiters Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson, Innis was a powerhouse to the Right. He led the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) for forty years and was the bane of so many civil rights figures on the Left.

He was an NRA member, telling blacks gun control was “meant to deprive you of your freedom,” and vehemently condemned affirmative action. He created further tensions among civil rights activists when he blamed the deaths of his sons on inner city thugs and drug dealers:

“My sons were not killed by the KKK or David Duke. They were murdered by young, black thugs. I use the murder of my sons by black hoodlums to shift the problems from excuses like the KKK to the dope pushers on the streets.”

NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre paid tribute to his friend, saying, “Roy got up every day and followed his conscience on what he thought was right, and if that led him to collide with political correctness, he was willing to take the heat.”

Innis served for two years in the Army, studied chemistry in college, and campaigned to be New York City Mayor twice but lost both times. He is survived by nine children, two sisters, and “numerous grandchildren,” according to The NY Daily News.

As far as some of his most memorable moments, Innis can go down in history as the only man to put the Rev. Al Sharpton on his then-fat ass on television during an explosive debate on the old Morton Downey Jr. Show:

(Watch that again for double the satisfaction.)

Upon hearing of Innis’s death, Sharpton buried the hatchet on Twitter, “Condolences to the family of Roy Innis who passed. We were adversaries on issues but respected each other.”

In another televised altercation, Innis was called an “Uncle Tom” by a white supremacist just before he wrapped his large hands around the puny white man’s throat. This was the infamous Geraldo-Rivera-takes-a-chair-to-the-face incident that was wildly popular in the mid-1980s (around the 2:00 mark):

​Sad to see a great conservative voice silenced, especially one who was never afraid to fight for what he believed in.