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Public Works: A Dangerous Trade By Robert Moses

McGraw-Hill, 952 pp., $14.50 In January of 1935, Secretary of the Interior Ickes, acting on orders from President Roosevelt, undertook the job of deposing Robert Moses as a member of the Triborough Bridge Authority. The hatchet man confessed to his diary that he was operating in unknown waters. “I don’t know Moses. From all accounts he is a highly disagreeable and unpleasant person who is also tremendously efficient.” By March, sadder and wiser, Ickes had found out just how unpleasant and efficient his intended victim could be. Years later Ickes observed, “If I had known as much about Moses at the beginning as I knew at the time of our surrender, I might have been able to save both my chief and myself some of the damage.” As it turned out, Moses became Chairman of the Authority in 1936, a position he did not relinquish until 1968.

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James Burnham

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Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Public Works: A Dangerous Trade By Robert Moses

McGraw-Hill, 952 pp., $14.50 In January of 1935, Secretary of the Interior Ickes, acting on orders from President Roosevelt, undertook the job of deposing Robert Moses as a member of the Triborough Bridge Authority. The hatchet man confessed to his diary that he was operating in unknown waters. “I don’t know Moses. From all accounts he is a highly disagreeable and unpleasant person who is also tremendously efficient.” By March, sadder and wiser, Ickes had found out just how unpleasant and efficient his intended victim could be. Years later Ickes observed, “If I had known as much about Moses at the beginning as I knew at the time of our surrender, I might have been able to save both my chief and myself some of the damage.” As it turned out, Moses became Chairman of the Authority in 1936, a position he did not relinquish until 1968.