The power broker : Robert Moses and the fall of New York
Page 182
PD Park Department
PEM Paul Emanuel Moses
Post New York Post
PWA Public Works Administration
RM Robert Moses
TA New York City Tunnel Authority
TBA Triborough Bridge Authority
TBTA Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority
WF World's Fair
WPA Works Progress Administration
WT New York World-Telegram
WT&S New York World-Telegram and Sun
INTRODUCTION :
Wait Until the Evening
NOTES
Swimming team episode: Author's interviews with E. C. M. Richards; although no other person was present at the Moses-Richards poolside confrontation, Richards' over-all story of the dispute over the approach to Ogden Reid is confirmed by three other members of the team: George Gordon Hyde and two others who agreed to discuss the matter only after a guarantee of anonymity.
Moses' idealism at Yale: Author's interviews with eleven of Moses' surviving Yale classmates, including Johnson. (See "Sources," Chapter 2.)
Swearing-in episode: Moscow, What Have You Done for Me Lately?, p. 196; author's interviews with Moscow, with Robert F. Wagner, Jr., with the Deputy Mayor in the little room down the hall, Jacob Lutsky, and Lutsky's assistant, Philip Shumsky, both of whom saw RM fill out the blank himself. Among those whom Wagner, prior to his inauguration, had told he was going to "rein in" RM, the author interviewed John A. Coleman, Howard S. Cullman, Hortense Gabel, Monroe
Notes for pages 12-37
Goldwater and Luther H. Gulick. They, former city legislative representative Reuben A. Lazarus and Moses aide Sidney M. Shapiro, saw the scene at the public swearing in. For further details, see "Notes," Chapter 34.
Mumford quote: Interview with author. 250,000: City Planning Commission, Tenant Relocation (see "Sources," Chapter 41).
2. Line of Succession
SOURCES
Books and newspapers:
Birmingham, Our Crowd; Rodgers, Robert Moses; Silver, Jews in the Political History of New York City, 1865-1892; issues of The Jewish Messenger and The Jewish Times, 1897.
Author's interviews:
The description of RM's home life and of his parents and grandparents has been drawn from interviews with his cousin Mrs. Hilda E. Hellman; with two of his sisters-in-law, Emily Sims Marconnier and Louise Benjamin Moses; with another of his relatives who wishes to remain anonymous and shall be identified as "confidential source"; from eleven interviews with his brother, Paul Emanuel Moses; as well as from interviews with Madison House trustees and staffers who worked with Bella and Emanuel Moses and who knew the "Moses boys," including Israel Ben Scheiber, Ruth Larned, Georges Friedlander and Ann and Louis Lubin; from interviews with RM's Yale classmates who spent considerable time at the Moses home, including Edward O. Proctor, Malcolm T. Dougherty and Elias ("Five A") Johnson.
NOTES
No middle name: Birth certificate, Connecticut State Department of Health. Reason for its omission: PEM, confidential source.
Bernhard Cohen: Mrs. Hellman, PEM; obituary, NYT, May 17, 1897; The Jewish Messenger, May 21, 1897. Jewish Times editorial, Sept. 24, 1875, quoted in Silver, p. 64.
Rosalie Silverman Cohen: Hellman, PEM, confidential source. Bella and Emanuel Moses: Rodgers, pp. 1-2; Mrs. Hellman, PEM, Louise Moses, Emily Marconnier, Ben Scheiber, Larned, Fried-
1179
lander, the I.ul t ProCtOC, Johnson. Quote is from Ben Scheiber.
Life on Dwight Street: RM, I! V two of the children who played with the Moses boys there, Edward F. Andi and Mrs. Paul Sperry.
"I didn't like New York": RM quoted in Rodgers, p. 2.
Settlement House movement: I am indebted io Birmingham, pp. 289-97. Quotes are from his book. Madison House: Forty Years of the House on Madison Street, a privately printed pamphlet; Larned, the Lubins, Fried-lander. Bella at Madison House: Ben Scheiber, the Lubins, Friedlander, Larned. First staffer quoted is Ben Scheiber, second Larned. The head worker in the story is Ben Scheiber.
The Moseses' financial situation: PEM, confirmed by confidential source.
"Oh, Dad": Dougherty, who also remembers the "solace" quote.
"Robert Moses is Bella Moses' son": This statement, repeated so often it is part of the family tradition, was made to the author by Mrs. Hellman, PEM, Louise Moses and confidential source.
2. Robert Moses at Yale
SOURCES
Books, newspapers and pamphlets:
Rodgers, Robert Moses. A picture of Yale in that era is furnished in George W. Pierson, Yale College: An Educational History, 1871-1921; and in such memoirs written by Yale men as Semi-Centennial by RM's classmate Leonard Bacon; as well as in the Yale Daily News and the Yale Courant, various issues, 1905-09; and in pamphlets published by the class, including Who's Who in 1909 (the Freshman Blue Book) and the "Class Histories" published at graduation and at ten-year intervals thereafter, down to 1959. (RM contributed articles of personal reminiscence to the 1949 and 1959 Class Histories.) In addition, classmate Ralph H. Clark wrote, and privately published, an instructive reminiscence: Four Years' Journey with Yale 1909 (1967).
Author's interviews:
With thirteen of RM's surviving classmates: William R. Babcock, Alexander C. Campbell, Ralph H. Clark, Malcolm T. Dougherty, Jackson A. Dykman, Elias ("Five A") Johnson, Robert L.
Notes for pages 38—47
1180
Levy, Paul G. Merrow, Jeremiah Mil-bank, Edward O. Proctor, E. C. M. Richards and two who prefer to remain anonymous, as well as with George Gordon Hyde '10 and two other members of the swimming team who prefer to remain anonymous.
NOTES
A tightly sealed society: Figures from Who's Who in 1909; the classmate is Dougherty. The fact that no Jew had ever made a Senior Society was a piece of common knowledge mentioned by several of RM's classmates. Bacon, p. 47.
Age: The 1909 Class History shows the average age at graduation to have been twenty-two years, nine months. RM was twenty years, six months. "Regarded as a young boy": Campbell.
"Almost a recluse": Dykman.
Closing his door: Rodgers, p. 9. The Mohegan Lake alumnus is Campbell.
Never won a race: RM himself, Richards, Hyde, examination of Yale Daily News. He lost one race, the fifty-yard crawl in a meet against CCNY, "by a few inches" in the "excellent time of 27 and 1/5 seconds" (Daily News, Dec. 7, 1908).
Poetry: "Song of the Arctic Nereid," Courant, Dec. 1907, p. 12; "Fragments," Nov. 1908, p. 34.
Idealism deep, reading for its own sake: Johnson, his roommate, in particular. "Durstig Geist": Dougherty.
Europe: Dougherty was his companion. "Mona Lisa" quoted in full in Rodgers, p. 8.
Samuel Johnson; Tinker's "fire": Pier-son, p. 427. RM credits Tinker with doing more than anyone else to, as Rodgers puts it, "arouse and stimulate his interest in literature and writing."
Officers chosen on merit: Johnson, Proctor. Social recognition for academics: RM editorial in Courant, Feb. 1909.
Walter Camp episode: "He regarded [it]": Bacon, quoted in Rodgers, p. 5. Bacon feels that RM's courage was "really magnificent." RM's version of the episode, given to the author, in an interview July 25, 1967, is confirmed by classmates' recollections, and Courant and Daily News articles. RM's editorials: Courant, Jan. 1908, pp. 294-99 (italics added), Jan. 1909, p. 219; Daily News, Nov. 23, 1907.
"Made the threat public": Courant,
Jan. 1909, pp. 219-20. "Quite a thing": Hyde.
Swimming-team episode: See "Notes," Introduction.
Yale Verse: The classmate was Carl H. P. Thurston, editor of the Yale Literary Magazine. A front-page review in the Yale Daily News, of Feb. 10, 1909, praised the volume, which was sold in New Haven bookstores for $1.25, saying: "The . . . selections are complete and represent painstaking efforts on the part of the editors."
Professor: Emerson D. Fite, quoted in Rodgers, p. 6.
Bull sessions: Johnson, Dougherty, Proctor, privat
e sources.
Senior Council: Yale Daily News, Feb. 11, 1909.
Class Day Committees: History of the Class of 1909, Yale College (1909). "Frankly": Dykman. The Class History sneered at the Courant also, saying (p. 9): "Six men entered the competition for places on the Lit and five of them were elected. The other one did not get anything accepted. ... He made the Courant."
"In our little world": Bacon, p. 47. He also said: "That the imbecile anti-semitism of half-grown boys should have cramped his form in any respect is no compliment to our respective intelligence." The attitude of RM's coterie is expressed by Proctor, who says: "He was outstanding, one of the better members of the class. He would certainly have been in a fraternity if he had not been a Jew." Another member of the coterie, James McConaughy, is quoted by Rogers (p. 6) as saying: "In an undergraduate group where fraternity membership counted largely, he gained a position of acknowledged leadership ... although himself not a fraternity man. . . . He was known for his brilliance and his independence. He was a great arguer and a fine conversationalist." The last, poignant word on his college career was spoken by RM at his class's fiftieth reunion in 1959, at which he was the principal speaker, and said, as if in passing: "Nor shall I stress at this late date the minor tragedies of college life, now muted, and shall merely suggest that those who were not the fortunate, whose doors the social forces of the time passed by, forget these childish tragedies and reflect how trivial they now seem in perspective. I would assume that on our fiftieth anniversary there are no outsiders."
Notes for pages 48-63 3. Home Away from Home
SOURCES
The principal sources for this chapter are Rodgers, Robert Moses; the author's interviews with PEM and with Malcolm T. Dougherty; and Moses, The Civil Service of Great Britain.
NOTES
American Club: The Oxford Times, Dec. 1909 (no more precise date available). The two speakers are identified only as "S. C. Custer" and a "Dr. Smyth."
Yale Alumni Weekly: Mar. 3, 191 1, Vol. 20, p. 583. "Universally loved": RM's Oxford classmate Hugh R. Norton to Sandra G. Turner (author's research assistant), Nov. 10, 1967.
Swimming and water polo: The Oxford Year Book, 1911, 1912. How bad the water-polo team was is indicated by the score by which it lost to Cambridge under RM's captaincy: 2iVi to V2. The players admired RM, however. Not only was RM the first American ever to captain the team, he was the first American ever to play on it, and when the second, Wilburt Davison, tried out for it in 1913, several players told him: "You're the second American ever to play on the team, and if you're as good as the first one, you'll be all right." Davison to author, Apr. 11, 1967.
Yale Alumni Weekly: Mar. 3, 191 1, Vol. 20, p. 584.
Affectations and letters to mother: PEM.
Congress on Race Problems: Dougherty; Rodgers has a toned-down version (p. 10). RM himself, in an interview with the author, told the story with glee.
Thesis: "excremental eloquence"; p. 47; "masterly vindication": p. 53; civil service as instrument for social reform: pp. 260-61; patronage "intolerable": p. 44; "far-sighted": p. 212; admires class differentiation: pp. 241-45 (interestingly, RM entitled the chapter in which he discussed this point "The Question of Intellectual Aristocracy"); "false democracy": p. 266; "this difficult question": p. 243; "The writer believes": p. 202; "remorseless exercise": p. 269; plea to his own country: pp. 246-70; "We must decide": p. 266 (his decision had already been made; "We must discriminate at the start on the basis of education": p. 264); faith in Wilson: p. 269.
1181 4. Burning
SOURCES
Books, pamphlets and articles:
Dahlberg, The New York Bureau <>f
Municipal Research: Graham, Education
for Public Administration; (ju'ick, The National Institute of Public Administration; Lewinson, John Purroy Mitctul Rodgers, Robert Moses.
Of dozens of articles on the BMR the most useful were: William H. Allen, "Training Men and Women for Public Service," Annals, May 1912; John M. Gaus, "The Present Status of the Study of Public Administration in the United States," The American Political Science Review, Feb. 1931.
Among the many pamphlets published by the BMR that give the flavor of the Bureau, the Training School and the reform sentiment of the era are: Training School for Public Service, Annual Report (1913); Training School for Public Service, Program of Courses and Field Work (1916-17); Announcement of the Training School for Public Service (1918).
Author's interviews:
The description of the attitude of the students at the Training School and of RM's activities and attitudes at the school and at the BMR is drawn from interviews with him—and from interviews with the following men who were at the BMR at the same time he was: Charles Beavers, Arthur E. Buck, Philip H. Cor-nick, Luther Gulick, Arch Mandel, Lewis Mayers, L. E. Meador, Chester E. Rightor. Other information derives from interviews with PEM, Emily Sims Mar-connier and RM's Yale classmate Edward O. Proctor.
Oral History Reminiscences:
William H. Allen, Mrs. Genevieve B. Earle, Luther Gulick, Frances Perkins, William Jay Schieffelin, Laurence A. Tan-zer, Leonard M. Wallstein.
NOTES
Beard quote: In Dahlberg, p. 39.
History of BMR: Dahlberg (discussion of budget, pp. 149-200). Bruere quote: Dahlberg, pp. 4, 37; Gulick.
Ahearn investigation: Dahlberg, pp. 17-19, 27; Lewinson, pp. 34-44-
A sense of mission: Graham, p. 136; Gulick, pp. 12-13.
"A new literature": Gulick.
"A place was waiting": RM.
Notes for pages 63-77
1182
"The system of the future": RM Ph.D.
thesis, p. 263.
Atmosphere at Training School and attitude of other students toward RM:
Gulick, Beavers, Buck, Cornick, Mandel, Mayers, Meador, Rightor; Perkins OHR, Vol. Ill, pp. 360-61.
"How would I sum up?": Cornick. "You couldn't walk in": Gulick. "The man best educated": Elias Johnson. Unfortunately RM's report cards cannot be found.
RM and Riverside Park: RM; Perkins OHR, Vol. Ill, pp. 362-63.
Lashing advisees: Gulick.
Might be fired shortly: Buck, Cornick; Perkins OHR, Vol. Ill, p. 360.
Mary Louise Sims: Her sister, Mrs. Marconnier; Rodgers, p. 20. "Very much in love": PEM and various social friends; the quote is from Edward O. Proctor. Meeting in the library: They were there so much several BMR students told the author she was the librarian.
"Mitchel took fire": Allen OHR.
RM appointment to Civil Service Commission: Allen OHR.
5. Age of Optimism
SOURCES
The situation in the NYC civil service in 1914 is described in RM's Detailed Report to the commission, July 8, 1915, a copy of which the author located by chance in the library of the Institute for Public Administration; the situation is also described in the Annual Reports of the Executive Committee of the New York Civil Service Reform Association, 1914-23 (1918 and 1920 are missing); it was also described by H. Elliot Kaplan in a series of interviews with the author. RM's fight, to implement his reorganization plan is detailed in newspapers in 1915, 1916 and 1917, although in detail only in the World and the Brooklyn Eagle, and in Allen and Amberg, Civic Lessons from Mayor Mitchel's Defeat. A transcript of one of the meetings at which Moskowitz, James and RM attempted to persuade municipal employees to support the plan, including RM's earnest pleas, is found in "Discussion of Employees' Service Rating," The Municipal Engineers Journal, May 1917. Kaplan, Lewis Mayers, Arthur E. Buck and Mrs. Luther Steward are among those who watched RM speak at those meetings. RM's feelings over his defeat show
clearly in a paper, "Standardization of Salaries and Grades in Civil Service," read on Dec. 29, 1916, to the American Political Science Association convention in Washington, D.C., reprinted in The American Political Science Review, 1916, pp. 296-314. Lewinson, John Purroy Mitchel, Graham, Education for Public Administration, and Kaplan, The Law of the Civil Service, as well as Rodgers, R
obert Moses, were also helpful, as was Francis E. Leupp, "Civil Service Reform and Common Sense," Atlantic Monthly, Jan. 1914, and Raymond Moley, in an interview.
Other interviews with: Charles Beavers, Moses' friend George Gove, Mary Moses' friend Mrs. Harold Morse, PEM, Edward O. Proctor.
NOTES
"We expect great things": Ordway quoted in NYT, May 16, 1914.
Attempt to fire Spencer: NYT, July 1,
1914. Steward and Kaplan quotes: Mrs.
Steward, Kaplan.
RM's first advice to commission: "Discussion of Employees' Service Rating."
Newspaper leak: The article is in Brooklyn Eagle. Details of leak: Apr. 7, 1914. RM's feelings: RM.
Working under RM: The feeling of the older men expressed by, among others, Buck. "He worked all of us hard": Beavers. Buck, among others, gives details of RM at work on this report.
Detailed Report: Quotes from pp. 5-11 (italics added). RM's aide is Mayers, who recalls RM disagreeing violently with the conventional theory that appointees to higher-level policy-making positions should be exempt from competitive examinations. RM told Mayers: "The higher up you get, the more need there is for working out rules."
RM's view on need to "eliminate" positions: Kaplan.
RM on the human element and public discussion: His "standardization" paper, The American Political Science Review, 1916, pp. 312 and 306, respectively.
"Clearly discernible": Mayers. "No reason why it cannot": PEM.
RM's confidence in Mitchel: Mayers, Buck, PEM.
"Pioneer work": Annual Report of the Executive Committee, 1916. Moskowitz and James quotes: "Discussion," p. 157. Mitchel's promise: NYT, Sept, 14, 1915.
Notes for pages 77-88
h:
RM and Mary: Yale classmate Proctor; Rodgers, p. 20. A friend, Mrs. Lorraine Fishel, who was visiting RM's sister, Edna, at Lake Placid, recalls that his campaign to get her interested in mountain climbing suffered a setback when, halfway up a heavily wooded mountain one morning, miles away from the path down, the couple became confused by an unexpected heavy fog. Realizing they were lost, RM told Mary to sit down and wait while he located the path. But by the time he found the path, he had forgotten the way back to Mary, and she stayed lost until, late in the day, the fog lifted.