The Foundation Head
The hot Summer sun beat down on the White House Ballroom construction, but to Howard Roark, the bright light was not the spotlight of fame; it was a cross-examination. He stood before the historic edifice, a structure that demanded nothing but the honest truth of its own integrity. It was a palace of the people, he had been told, a place where the spirit of the nation was captured in stone and glass. But now, the spirit was trapped behind the red tape of injunctions, a paper barricade erected by the small men who believed that a building must be a copy of the original to have any right to exist.
He saw the judges in his mind’s eye, not as men of law, but as shadows of the past. They sat at their high bench, clutching the history of 1812 like a shield against the present. They called him a tenant, a mere custodian of a house that belonged to the people. They muttered of Versailles, of the British burning, of the need for an Act of Congress to alter a single brick. They were terrified of the future, terrified of a building that did not apologize for its own existence. They wanted the White House to be a monument to mediocrity, where no new idea could breathe without their permission.
Roark knew the difference between the Design Architect and the Architect of Record. He was the former, the creator of the vision, the one who saw the beauty in the function, the one who knew that the structure was the key to the soul of the building. The Architects of Record were the small men, the clerks who sealed the documents, who ensured the code compliance, who stood between the vision and the reality—not to protect the truth—but to protect the status quo. They were the men who said that a building needed no beauty, no ornament, no theme, because they were afraid of the beauty of the human spirit.
“Mr. Janss, when you buy an automobile, you don’t want it to have rose garlands about the windows, a lion on each fender and an angel sitting on the roof. Why don’t you?”
“That would be silly,” stated Mr. Janss.
“Why would it be silly? I think it would be beautiful. Besides, Louis the Fourteenth had a carriage like that and what was good enough for Louis is good enough for us. We shouldn’t go in for rash innovations and we shouldn’t break with tradition.”
The court had ordered him to stop. They said he had not the authority to proceed. But Roark knew authority did not come from a court, nor from Congress, nor from those who styled themselves judges, much less the little litigants who filed suit. Authority came from the man who built, the man who created, the man who knew what creativity is, that it was giving a part of him, that it was a reflection of the American soul. The court could stop the construction, but they could not cloud the vision. They could not blot out the beauty of the building, the beauty of the idea that a building could be a thing of beauty, that it could be a monument to the individual man, to the man who dared to build without the limitations of the small men.
Roark looked at the blueprints, the documents that the Architects of Record had signed, the seals that they had stamped onto the paper. He saw the names of the men who had tried to stop him, the men who had called him a tenant, who had called him a wrecker. He saw the names of the men who had tried to make the White House Ballroom a place of grumbling, a palace of the small men. He knew that they would try again, that they would bring more laws, more injunctions, more lawsuits to stop him. But he also knew that they would fail, that the building would rise, that the beauty of the building would speak for itself.
He thought of the words of Ellsworth Toohey, the man who had tried to make the world believe that the new architecture was a collective effort, that the individual was a myth. Toohey had said that the rules of the new architecture were strict, that the building must be a packing crate of glass and concrete. He had said that the building must be a symbol of the worker, of the collective, of the small men. But Roark knew that the building was not a symbol, that it was a thing of itself, that it was a monument to the individual, to the man who dared to build without the permission of the small men.
“Will you tell us—in professional terms—your opinion of the structure known as the White House Ballroom?”
“Yes. Sure. The White House Ballroom ... The White House Ballroom has an improperly articulated plan, which leads to spatial confusion. There is no balance of masses. It lacks a sense of ... symmetry. Its proportions are inept.”
He spoke in a monotone. His neck was stiff; he was making an effort not to let it drop forward, “It’s out of scale. It contradicts the elementary principles of composition. The total effect is that of ... ”
“Louder please, Mr. Keating,”
“The total effect is that of crudeness and architectural illiteracy. It shows ... it shows no sense of structure, no instinct for beauty, no creative imagination, no ...” He closed his eyes, “ ... artistic integrity ... ”
“Thank you, Mr. Keating. That is all.”
Roark knew the small men would not give up; but he knew they would fail. The new building would rise above the small men, and the beauty of the building would speak for itself. The building was a monument to the individual citizen, to the one who dared to build without the permission of the small men. The new building was a testament to the future, to the man who dared to build without the permission of the small men.
“A building creates its own beauty, and its ornament is derived from the rules of its theme and its structure,” Cameron had said. “A building needs no beauty, no ornament and no theme.”
Meeting Toohey a few days later, Peter Keating asked, disturbed:
“Say, Ellsworth, did you mean it?”
“What?”
“About modern architecture.”
“Of course I meant it. How did you like my little piece?”
Ellsworth Toohey did not look at the plans which Keating had spread out on his desk. He stared at the perspective drawings. He stared, his mouth open. Then he threw his head back and howled with laughter.
“Peter,” he said, “you’re a genius.”
He added: “I think you know exactly what I mean.”
“You God-damn fool!” said Gail Wynand. “What are you up to?”
He threw Roark a copy of the Banner, folded at an inside page. The page bore a photograph captioned: “Architect's drawing of the $15,000,000 Federal White House Project to be built in Washington, D.C., Keating & Dumont, architects.”
Roark glanced at the photograph and asked: “What do you mean?”
“You know damn well what I mean. Do you think I picked the things in my art gallery by their signatures? If Peter Keating designed this, I'll eat every copy of the Banner.”
“Peter Keating designed this, Gail.”
“You fool. What are you after?”
“If I don’t want to understand what you're talking about, I won't understand it, no matter what you say.”
“Oh, you might, if I run a story to the effect that a certain housing project was designed by Howard Roark, which would make a swell exclusive, and a joke on one Mr. Toohey, who is the boy-behind-the-boys on most of those damn projects.”
“You publish that and I'll sue the hell out of you.”
“You really would?”
Howard Roark knew that the building was his to make great again, that it was a part of him, that it was a reflection of his soul. He knew that the court could not stop him, that the building would rise, that the beauty of the new building would speak for itself. The small men would try again, but they would fail. The building would rise, and the beauty of the building would speak for itself. The building was a monument to the individual citizen, to the one who dared to build without the permission of the small men. The building was a testament to the past, to the men who dared to build a nation without the approval of small men.