From Radical Leftist to Conservative Activist: Remembering David Horowitz

Epoch Times

10-05-2025

Commentary
David Horowitz, the radical leftist-turned-conservative activist and author,
The cause of death was cancer. Horowitz is
Horowitz's influence was perhaps best summarized by conservative New York Times columnist Ross Douthat in a
'[E]veryone who is a young person on the political right in the 1990s and early 2000s, as I was, has had at least one encounter with David Horowitz of one kind or another. Sixties radicalism definitely lived on in his postradical phase, I think it's fair to say.'
While I never met Horowitz, I did have the opportunity to read his autobiography 'Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey' for a college final paper. Somewhat ironically, the book had been recommended by a famous left-wing professor at my university whose class on the history of the American Left I was taking.
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Reading the memoir would become a highlight of my college career. Horowitz was, at heart, a superb storyteller.
The future journalist and commentator was born in Forest Hills, Queens, in New York City, in 1936, the grandson of Russian Jews who had immigrated to the U.S. His parents were high school teachers and devoted members of the American Communist Party. That all changed when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1956 issued his 'secret speech' that denounced former Soviet dictator Josef Stalin for crimes against humanity.
The speech was leaked to the Western press, and it led the American Communist Party to
Fulfilling the American dream, Horowitz would go on to attend some of America's finest universities. He graduated from Columbia University in 1959 with a degree in English, and he later earned a master's degree in the subject from the University of California at Berkeley. That was followed by a position at the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in London. Horowitz eventually made his way back to the U.S., where
In the 1960s, both Collier and Horowitz were devoted believers in left-wing causes. They wrote against the Vietnam War, and in his memoir, Horowitz recounts how the conflict became a foil for the Left's antagonism against the American way of life.
'[The war] was not ultimately about Vietnam, but about our antagonism to America, our desire for revolution,'
Horowitz also became acquainted with the Black Panthers during this period, in particular cultivating a friendship with the group's founder, Huey P. Newton. As Horowitz would tell it, he even helped
A few months later, Van Patter would disappear, and her severely beaten body would be
Van Patter's slaying was a point of no return for Horowitz's relationship with the American Left.
'In pursuit of answers to the mystery of Betty's death, I subsequently discovered that the Panthers had killed more than a dozen people in the course of conducting extortion, prostitution, and drug rackets in the Oakland ghetto,' Horowitz
'While these criminal activities were taking place, the group enjoyed the support of the American Left, the Democratic Party, Bay Area trade unions, and even the Oakland business establishment,' he continued.
Horowitz would take his same zeal for justice that he had when he was on the Left to his work on the Right. He joined a rising group of former left-wing intellectuals in rejecting Marxism and socialism and supporting the policies of President Ronald Reagan. That took the form of publishing influential articles like '
The two men would go on to publish
Horowitz was a pioneer in combating the Left in America, and today he has many imitators. He went on campus tours, where
Horowitz even has some compatriots in academia with centers devoted to preserving and restoring Western civilization
A major theme of Horowitz's memoir is the importance of family. Even when he was at the height of his left-wing political involvement, the journalist noted that his wife and children kept him more grounded than many of his peers.
In an atomistic society, where Americans increasingly leave their homes for opportunities, and where digital interaction offers the false promise of genuine human connection, we could all do with holding our families a little tighter.
Reprinted by permission from
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.