A modern Don Quixote fought the good fight

0 Comments | Insight on the News, June 9, 1997 | by Lee Edwards

L. Brent Bozell II delighted in tilting at windmills all his life. He laid down his lance for the last time on April 15 at the age of 71.

He was an implacable anti-communist in an age of accommodation. In March 1962, when President John F. Kennedy still was explaining why he had not challenge, the Soviets in Berlin, Bozell urged 18,500 conservatives rallying in New York City's Madison Square Garden to issue an order to the Berlin commander: "Tear down the Wall!"

He was an eloquent conservative at a time when liberalism seemed to be the way, the truth and the light. In 1960, Bozell collaborated with Sen. Barry Goldwater of Arizona to write the most widely read political manifesto of the 20th century -- The Conscience of a Conservative.

And, he was a traditional Catholic in the era of aggiornamento. In 1965, he founded and edited Triumph magazine, which for more than a decade challenged liberal Catholics on moral and political issues from abortion to Vatican II.

In each instance, the establishment was certain that Bozell and his confreres were on the wrong side. But time has proved Bozell was correct about these three great "Cs'" of the 20th century -- communism, conservatism and Catholicism. To wit: Communism could be defeated, not just contained. Conservatism, not liberalism, would emerge as the dominant political idea of America. And Pope John Paul II, not Hans Kung, was the true face of the Roman Catholic Church.

Born in Omaha, Brent Bozell served in the U.S. Merchant Marine and the Navy in the Pacific during World War II. He was tall and red-haired with Lincolnesque features and more than a little of Lincoln's ability to inspire people with words.

He attended Yale University, where he met and became a close friend of William F. Buckley Jr. and family. So close, in fact, that Bozell married Patricia, Buckley's sister, beginning a fruitful 48-year union that would produce 10 children, 24 grandchildren and a great grandson.

After graduating from Yale, Bozell began his law career in San Francisco, but moved to Washington in 1954 where he joined the staff of -- who else? -- the most controversial member of the U.S. Senate, Joseph R. McCarthy of Wisconsin. He wrote speeches for McCarthy and also coauthored, along with Buckley, the most convincing apologia ever of the senator and his cause -- McCarthy and His Enemies.

He helped Buckley found National Review which, 40 years later, remains the most influential conservative magazine in America. He twice ran for public office in Montgomery County, Md., but was deemed too conservative by the voters. There was no disgrace attached to his defeats: Nelson Rockefeller would have been found wanting by the liberals who dominated the county.

In the winter of 1960 Bozell wrote his most important and enduring work. He was asked by Clarence Manion, former dean of Notre Dame's law school, to help Goldwater write a book about "Americanism." The collaborative result was The Conscience of a Conservative, which has sold more than 3.5 million copies and once was required reading for History 169b at Harvard University.

It would be almost impossible to overstate the book's impact on the young conservatives of the day who now sit in Congress, manage campaigns, conduct national polls, head think tanks, edit magazines, host talk shows and run for president. Their legion includes Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi, House Majority Leader Dick Armey of Texas, presidential candidate (and commentator) Patrick Buchanan, Heritage Foundation President Edwin J. Feulner Jr., direct-mail guru Richard A. Viguerie, TV network founder Paul Weyrich and Virginia national committeeman Morton Blackwell.

"I loved the clarity of Conscience," explained former Sen. Bill Brock of Tennessee, an architect of the new GOP in the South. "It turned on the lights." Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas revealed that "my first political thoughts, in the 11th grade, came from reading The Conscience of a Conservative." With the appearance of Conscience, Goldwater became the political heir to Robert Taft and McCarthy, the hope of disgruntled Republicans, partyless independents and despairing Democrats as well as the spokesman of a political movement destined to change the course of the nation and the world.

At Bozell's funeral service at Our Lady of Mount Carmel, near the Catholic University of America in Washington, there were politicians and priests (including his son, Michael, a Benedictine monk and ordained priest), brother-in-law, Bill and a varicolored flock of the Sisters of Charity, the innocent and the guilty (Brent faithfully visited the inmates of Washington's Lorton Correctional Complex in Northern Virginia every week for years), Catholics, Protestants and Jews. All of these had experienced his formidable energy and boundless charity.

Their prayers floated up to heaven where Brent Bozell already was deep in conversation with Miguel de Cervantes about duty, honor, country and windmills.