Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York

I'm going to return the book because it's missing the first pages.

This is a brilliant elucidation and proof of Acton's famous aphorism that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It is more perfect in this respect than his monumental and equally fine tomes on Lyndon Johnson who at least had principles and who having got to the top he intended to put into practice before being derailed by Vietnam. He was a truly tragic figure for which admiration and disgust vie in the mind of the readerThere is no redeeming feature in Caro's depiction of Moses who was a truly vile man through and through and who desired power solely for power's sake. His character for all his ability is comprehensively demolished by this great work. Unfortunately the infrastructure he built and which destroyed so much of value in New York even if it could be demolished would not restore what has been lost.Perhaps most culpable in this tale is not the way that mayors caved into this demonic ego but the way the vaunted press lapped up everything Moses said and almost never challenged it. Where are America's investigative journalists? Largely comatose. But here I have my one quibble. There is no mention at all of the journalist Jane Jacobs, nor of her influential book,The Death and Life of American Cities, and nor of her considerable role in toppling Moses from his pedestal. This is an odd omission, and we know that she read Caro's hatchet job with relish, commenting that even though she knew Moses was an awful man this book was a shocking revelation. She had opposed his policies but not exposed his vile personality in all its vividness. It took Caro - one man delving deep into documents and sources, -to pull all the threads together to weave a shroud for a vampire. Moses was a monster, a racist, a bully a self-centred egotist, only interested in himself, indifferent to those he demeaned or whose lives he destroyed. It reminds me at least of another who has recently attained great power. Men such as Moses are the American nightmare.

Thanks.

Awesome book but pathetic printer. I have reached Page 200 and every single page page preceeding it has come apart. This is just pathetic.

Long an admirer of Robert A Caro’s biographies of LBJ, I confess I had ignored The Power Broker because at first glance a book about a man who built bridges, roads, parks and civic buildings sounded bland compared to the complex personality of Lyndon Johnson. I was wrong and this book fully deserves its reputation as one of the best biographies ever written. Robert Moses was a peculiar man, initially fascinated by, of all things, the British Civil Service and how it remained incorruptible. He doesn’t appear to have been formally trained in anything but he quickly mastered the tedious aspects of statutes and how they are drafted, power structures and where true control and authority lie. He learned a great deal from Gov Al Smith, to whom he was devoted, but unlike Smith, Moses was not a benign man. Throughout his career his personal power was protected by foresight, and the killer clause. He was never elected to anything (and his one attempt to run for office almost destroyed him by exposing his raw and ruthless personality). He was Park Commissioner because that role gave him the kind of inviolate authority that politicians could only envy. It also meant that the public thought he fought on the side of the angels because everyone likes parks. In his early days he was an idealist, and armed with a letter of passage by the Governor, he tirelessly explored the virgin hinterland of New York, jealously guarded by the Robber Baron families who wanted to exclude the riff-raff from the wilderness and the seaside. He planned Parkways that would enable middle-class Americans to drive to the countryside previously barred to them by the privileged. He built vast and luxurious venues where previously there had been just sand, with building materials and leisure facilities second to none. He understood structural engineering and drove his loyal (and often terrified) staff to produce blueprints and plans and costings in record time. And although he was most active during the Depression years, money never seemed to be a problem. The myriad financial deals and bond issues can become dense at times but they were directly related to the freedom given him by the structure of an ‘Authority’, compared to a municipality, city or state administration. He had no personal interest in money, and coming from a wealthy family had refused a salary. He was ‘money honest’ but as his taste for power grew he became corruptible, fascinated by power for its own sake. The idealist of the early chapters soon turns into something of a monster with huge prejudices against lower class people, blacks and ethnics. When he built his Expressways and Parkways he deliberately made the bridges crossing them too low to permit buses because he just wasn’t interested in people who didn’t drive a car. Ironically, he never learned to drive a car himself and was chauffered everywhere in a luxurious limo that served as his mobile office. As his engineering megalomania grew he evicted thousands of tenants and bulldozed their houses and tenements to make way for another road. The cruelty with which this was done was later exposed and led to his downfall. He drove his engineers and structural crews very hard and the New York bridges he built are his monuments along with the UN Building and the Lincoln Centre. Only very late did it dawn on people that Moses’ roads didn’t reduce congestion at all; they did the opposite, feeding traffic into huge jams and making commuting a nightmare. Cars didn’t just fill roads, they needed to be parked in the City and at the airport. Moses despised trains and buses so mass transit was never part of his plans, as anyone lining up for a cab at JFK can testify. Yet this fascinating man continues to confound the reader. Physically driven, he worked long days then relaxed by diving into the sea and swimming for miles. The atmosphere in his offices was lively and chatty and invigorating and he instilled loyalty as well as affection (and terror). He always defended his subordinants fiercely and was contemptuous of complaints, petitions or legal challenges. He cultivated the press who loved him to the point of dereliction of duty as far as the common good was concerned. For a long time most of the press were in awe of him and he could do no wrong, and the little people he had pushed around had to wait a long time for justice. But he was a mean SOB too, unforgiving and vengeful. Chapter 26 is a fascinating description of his relationship with his older brother, who he destroyed, and his mother, and only a psychiatrist could unravel the darkness there. (Chapter 35 also gives fascinating insights into Moses). But Caro’s skill as a biographer makes us feel sorry for Moses when his downfall finally arrives, at the hands of some maverick reporters and Nelson Rockefeller. At the same time the realisation dawns that his life’s work as a builder of roads and bridges caused far more problems than it resolved, and ultimately his career was devalued. Power was so important to him that to be excluded from it was agony, and he became a ghost haunting a landscape he had built.