I know, I know … I’ve fallen behind on my weekly schedule for what I’m calling “The Power Broker Project”. But I am going to do my best to see it all the way through, even if takes longer than planned. The 99% Invisible podcast’s reading club of The Power Broker really is helping me stay motivated too. I will keep pushing through the book so that I can listen to the next episode. (I only listen to them after completing the reading.) In all fairness to Robert Caro though, his writing is compelling and thoroughly keeps in engaged too. With that here is my response for the next section’s reading.

Robert Moses attained a position of power by installing himself as Long Island State Park Commission president and as the chairman of the State Council of Parks. He came to effectively wield (and abuse) these powers with the backing of “three formidable weapons.” (pg. 193)

First, parks were strongly supported by the public as they were seen as something fundamentally good: “… anyone who fought for parks fought under the shield of the presumption that he was fighting for the right.” (pg. 193) And second, the fight for parks was caricaturized as a battle between “wealth vs. lack of wealth, privilege vs. impotence, influence vs. helplessness, ‘rich golfers’ vs. the sweating masses of the cities.” (pg. 193)

With these two “weapons”, Moses was cast as a public hero and could easily enlist the press to gain advantages against his enemies. He became a “master propogandist” and in an about face to his idealist principles of right vs. wrong, he no longer cared about whether the press depicted the full facts, since it was in his favor. (pg 190) The New York Times would run pages rallying for Moses in his case against W. Kingsland Macy, while leaving little room for Macy’s side: “It was not just a case of inequality of space and play. The Time’s articles repeated, day after day, as if they were uncontested facts, the key contentions made by Moses and Smith. … The key contentions of Moses’ opponents were almost totally ignored.” (pg 197)

The press not only weakened Moses’s opponents but also took every occasion to lionize him. So much so that Moses “gleamed in the public conscious with an aura … of a fearless, fiercely in dependent public servant who loved parks above all else and was willing to fight for parks against politicians, bureaucrats and the hated forces of wealth and influence.” (pg 188) As the parks started open and the public began to benefit from them, these campaigns only became more forceful. “New Yorkers knew who was primarily responsible for the boon they had been given. … the praise, on front pages and editorial pages alike, continued day after day.” (pg 238)

It was from these first two weapons that Moses’s drew tremendous power and confidence from being on the “right side”: “As long as you have public opinion on your side, your safe. ‘As long as you’re on the side of the parks, you’re on the side of the angels. You can’t lose.’” (pg 218)

The last weapon that backed Moses growing power was Al Smith’s unwavering support, which gave Moses a “blind faith in Smith’s ability to rescue him from consequences.” In fact, we see him adopt the Machiavellian philosophy of the end justifying the means to do whatever it takes in order to realize his dreamt up parks. This could even entail “furnishing misleading information” and “underestimating costs”. He would start physical projects even before having full permission, knowing that once something was built, it was hard to undo. He would trick a Legislature to give enough money to just begin a project, knowing “it would be virtually forced to give you the money to finish it.” These maneuverings were only possible because Moses was under the protection of Al Smith.

These three weapons, really gave Moses a power and confidence. “As long as he had public power, as long as he was representing the state, he would have the means of … denying justice to his opponents, of shielding himself from punishments.” (pg 220) Robert Moses “could, with far more impunity than any private citizen, defy the law. He glorified in the knowledge: he boasted and bragged about it.” (pg 220) And with this flexibility, he was fully free to command his park dreams into reality.