A review of David Horowitz’ Uncivil Wars: The Controversy Over Reparations for Slavery, Encounter Books (San Francisco, 2002)

Before Sept. 11, the biggest story to hit campuses in 2001 was the Horowitz Affair. In February of last year, 60s-radical-turned-conservative-journalist David Horowitz attempted to place a full-page advertisement in student papers at a number of prestigious colleges and universities. The ad, entitled "Ten Reasons Why Reparations Is [sic] a Bad Idea for Blacks — and Racist Too", consisted of a series of sensible (if inevitably provocative) arguments against the idea that black Americans should be paid reparations for the enslavement of their ancestors.

The upshot of Horowitz’ effort is no doubt still fresh in the minds of many. Of the papers Horowitz contacted about his ad, most refused to run it. Several of those that did run the ad, however, quickly apologized to their readers for having become, in the words of Daily Californian editor Daniel Hernandez, "an inadvertent vehicle for bigotry". Hernandez was hardly alone in these sentiments. Increasingly as the weeks passed and the controversy snowballed, a consensus grew on campus: Horowitz was hurting feelings; Horowitz must be stopped. There followed the usual left-wing crime spree: editors intimidated, news rooms invaded, print runs stolen and destroyed. To his credit, Horowitz did not back down. On the contrary, he embarked on a national speaking tour in defense of his views.

By early March, the controversy over reparations had gained the attention of the national media. On both left and right, the Horowitz Affair (as it was quickly dubbed) was covered as a debate over free speech. And it certainly was that. What student protesters were demanding was nothing short of the suppression of speech with which they disagreed. Rather than take up Horowitz’ challenge and produce reasons of their own in favor of reparations, minority student groups, with the collusion of campus administrators, sought to silence him by resorts to force and cries of "outrage." While conservative writers (this one included) seized hold of the Horowitz Affair as yet another opportunity to denounce double standards on campus, the liberal press did its best to change the subject. Was anyone really talking about reparations before Horowitz brought it up? some wondered in annoyance (yes, they were). Were conservatives really as interested in free speech as they claimed? asked others such as Salon's David Mazel.

Yet, in the midst of all this controversy, the idea of reparations itself was somehow lost. And this, of course, is precisely what the ad’s critics wanted. As Horowitz writes in Uncivil Wars: The Controversy Over Reparations for Slavery, his just-released account of last Spring’s campaign against reparations: "Despite the ruckus that the ad had caused, its ‘Ten Reasons’ had not really been answered, or even addressed. Instead, its opponents had launched a vitriolic attack on the character of those who stood in their path. The radicals applied the epithets ‘racist’ and ‘bigot’ not only to anyone who supported my ideas, but also to those who printed them or defended my right to express them. The ideas themselves were stigmatized as an infection the campus must mobilize to repel."

And yet, as I wrote at the time of the controversy, there is on the face of it nothing offensive about Horowitz’ ad. Indeed, each of Horowitz’ "Ten Reasons" is sensible and pertinent. Taken together, they represent a powerful case for what every reasonable person already knows: that the idea of reparations for slavery is one of the most ludicrous and offensive ideas in the already-sizable book of ludicrous and offensive ideas.

To cite just a few of the reasons offered by Horowitz against reparations: While reparations have been paid to victim groups in the past, there is no precedent for paying reparations to the descendants of victim groups. But even if there were such a precedent, those who would wind up paying reparations — that is, American taxpayers — are overwhelmingly descended from people who never owned slaves. How can one justify asking them to pay reparations for a crime of which neither they nor their ancestors are guilty? Think about it; it really is a bizarre idea. Imagine serving time for a crime that your next-door neighbor’s maternal great-grandfather committed against the maternal great-grandfather of the guy who lives down the street. There you have the case for reparations. No wonder Horowitz’ critics were reluctant to meet him in debate.

More generally, the idea that this generation of white Americans owes this generation of black Americans reparations for a crime that neither group willed and that ended over 140 years ago is both divisive and, in the long run, politically disastrous. To insist that white Americans owe black Americans for slavery is to endorse the view that white America (as well as Asian-America, Latino America, etc.) is morally compromised solely by virtue of skin color and without any regard for present realities. Doesn’t such a view amount to the lewdest kind of racism? As Horowitz puts it in Uncivil Wars:

Americans do not think of themselves as racists or oppressors, and there is no reason they should. America was a pioneer in the fight against slavery, and in establishing the first multiracial society in human history. During the last half-century Americans have voted equal rights to African-American citizens and supported massive compensations to African-Americans and others who have lagged behind. To be indicted after such efforts, and in these unrelenting terms, is offensive and insulting.

The reparations movement, in short, was doomed from the outset. The most it can achieve is to further embitter the already (unfortunately and unnecessarily) bitter relations which obtain between the races. "Our future, like our past, depends on fidelity to ideas and ideals that inspire a common identity," writes Horowitz. "The fault line that threatens this American identity is race. What this means is that there can be no common future if America becomes unable to maintain the affections of its diverse communities or if its political divisions become defined by race."

But if reparations are such a bad idea, why do so many on campus support it? It is in answering this question that Horowitz is at his best. Over the past 20 years, Horowitz argues, a culture of grievance has come to dominate the American university. Where free speech and open inquiry once reigned, there are now speech codes and political litmus tests in faculty hiring. Each new generation of undergraduates is today submitted to a rigorous indoctrination in the finer points of diversity rhetoric, and "sensitivity" has become a byword for Stalinist crackdowns on minority opinion. Overseeing all this are campus administrators whose chief interest is to ensure that the entire regime, however oppressive, remains well greased. For Horowitz, who is himself a former radical, the irony is particularly acute: "While a student activist in the 1960s, I do not remember receiving private communiqués from university presidents to salve my hurt feelings when my radical demands weren’t met. I do not remember these officials offering university funds to help us publish our protests. Back then, we radicals were tolerated for what we were — people whose objectives were at odds with free intellectual inquiry and inimical to the uses of the university. Today, the opposite is true. Student radicals blackmail administrators at will and administrators create the intellectual atmosphere that invites such blackmail."

And this, perhaps, is the most important lesson to be gained from the controversy over reparations for slavery. More so than any other recent campus spat, the Horowitz Affair drew attention to the sorry state in which American higher education now finds itself. As Horowitz puts the matter, the reparations imbroglio "makes disturbingly clear that the liberal arts divisions of American institutions of higher learning are breeding grounds of some of the most retrograde ideas and reactionary trends in our political culture and, worse, shows that the behaviors are protected and even encouraged by the guardians of the institutions themselves." By returning to last year’s battlefield, Uncivil Wars aims to set the record straight. It is at once a forceful restatement of the case against reparations and a stinging indictment of those on campus — students, faculty and administrators — who continue to choose intimidation over debate. Thanks to Horowitz, their job will never be the same.