Howard Roark never attempts to argue the law, or to argue
that he was legally justified in destroying Cortlandt Homes, the model housing project
meant to provide cheap and durable housing for low-income renters. Instead, his defense
comes from his personal philosophy of rational self-interest, and of the right of a man
to own and distribute his own ideas. In his speech to the jury, he explains how he
stands with egoists of history, creating without concern for the will of the
collective:
"I designed Cortlandt. I gave it to
you. I destroyed it.
"I destroyed it
because I did not choose to let it exist. It was a double monster. In form and in
implication. I had to blast both. The form was mutilated by two second-handers who
assumed the right to improve upon that which they had not made and could not equal. They
were permitted to do it by the general implication that the altruistic purpose of the
building superseded all rights and that I had no claim to stand against
it."
(Rand, The Fountainhead, Google
Books)
In other words, Roark believed his claim to
the design and the purpose of the homes to be superior to the claim on it by the public.
His design was given in contract on the condition that the homes be built exactly as he
designed; when they were altered for no reason, he refused on a moral basis to allow his
design to be perverted by the will of others for any reason. Roark rejects the idea that
his design is subject to alteration, especially when he sees that the alterations are
done for no pragmatic purpose, but for vanity and superficiality. Again, he explicitly
admits to the exact crime charged, with the caveat that it is only a crime according to
the public view that no man is entitled to own his own ideas. Roark's explanation of his
philosophy sways the jury and he is acquitted.
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