While last week’s class left me despising the being that was Robert Moses, I got a fuller, better picture of his personage this week, and I’m open and willing to admit to that.
Caro, in previous chapters, discusses the families displaced and the houses destroyed by Moses, but in chapter 42 tells of a unique story where Moses did not really “win” after all. I would not say that he considers the Tavern on the Green a complete win for democracy because of his tone at the end of the chapter. While the people did “beat” Moses, Caro implies that the media overplayed the whole story, so he does not perceive it as such a major win. While I would agree with Caro in that sense, I would also have to say that, relatively, the story was a major victory for democracy because Moses was A) SO hard to beat B) so rarely beaten. However, it makes one question–if this is a case of such a unique win for democracy (regardless of how great you think it is), how democratic is the system, really?
It’s obvious that with Moses’ incredible power as Commissioner, democracy sat on the sidelines as he often took power into his own hands. Nonetheless, Ken Jackson does not feel that he was as overwhelming a being as Caro describes him to be. He compares him to the leaders of Detroit, who “turned to the federal bulldozer” more frequently than Moses did, and points out that he did not build as many apartments per capita as Danzig in Newark did. Furthermore, he highlights that many of the building ideas were not originally his, but rather, that he was the one who took them to action. He does not think him to be as immense a man as Caro does.
Nonetheless, it is all, again, relative. New York City hadn’t experienced a Robert Moses before. The people were not prepared for what was ahead when he first got the position of Commissioner; after learning his personality and finally being prepared, their hardest efforts at ever stopping him usually went unheard. While he was extremely capable and efficient at getting things done, Moses’ capabilities at manipulating a democratic system are really what made him stand out as a leader in doing so. So while the people won a small victory in their fight for legal democracy, Moses almost always maintained his status as a “great man”–relatively. Then again, your definition of “great” is relative too…
