Q Toon: Status Quo Anti

Well, folks, this is my gamble on Sunday on a cartoon idea that I thought would still be relevant after Tuesday.

I could have been delightfully wrong, I suppose. A blue wave could have swept all the transphobes out of office on Tuesday. But as our experience in Wisconsin has shown, they would still be able to wreak all sorts of mischief on their way out the door. Including refusing to leave.

Even a cartoon celebrating the end of instant fund-raising messages from the political parties and candidates could have gone awry.  All it would have taken would be for there to be some run-off election needed somewhere that would tip the balance of the House or Senate or governorship or state legislature, as Georgia foisted on us all the last two elections.

As I noted in Monday's sneak peek, we've had two presidential elections in the 2000's in which the outcome was still uncertain when Wednesday morning's newspapers went to press. We are now told to expect that to be the norm (and not just because Wednesday morning's newspapers are printed a couple hundred miles away these days).

One of my cartooning colleagues posted on Facebook the other day that the editor of one of his subscribing publications had asked him to supply them with some cartoons about something other than the election. It's a reasonable sounding request; nobody wants to go to print with this year's DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.

Or Harry Murphy's cartoon congratulating President-elect Charles Evans Hughes.

But my colleague said no. He's not the type to draw cartoons about sports scores or how sad it is that there was flooding in Valencia — although fresh carnage in Gaza or Lebanon might have piqued his interest. The guy has managed to crank out a cartoon every day almost without fail for several years now.

The fact is that there is very little else to draw editorial cartoons about in this country this week. Even our foreign co-workers appear to be fixated on our presidential election.

Anyway, I've chosen to publish this post in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, regardless of whether we know for sure who the next President of the United States is or not.

And, of course, whether Donald The Terrible and all those Republican House and Senate candidates are able to carry out their campaign promises to criminalize and persecute transgender Americans and their families.

Splendid Isolation

After Thursday's debacle — er, debate — no, I was right the first time — I for one am willing to try retreating to 1924 and all the global issues facing our presidential candidates that year.

"Der Januskopf de Präsidenten Coolidge" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, June 1, 1924

I had initially intended to use this German cartoon in my recent post with the cartoons of Republican vice presidential nominee Charles Dawes, since the face on the right speaking to the German people does not look much like the face on the left. The cartoon was drawn before Dawes was tapped for the second spot on the Coolidge ticket, but he would have been the face of the U.S. proposal for settling the European dispute over German war reparations.

The face doesn't look very much like Dawes, either. But on the other hand, Werner Hahmann probably did not have many photos of Dawes in profile to work from. And Coolidge was somewhat new to the world stage.

Either way, it's one (or two) very different depiction/s of "Silent Cal" than one usually sees from the period.

The tiny text at upper right explains the context of the cartoon:

(Auf dem Jaresdiner der "Liga für nationale Sicherheit" sagte Präsident Coolidge, "Swachliches Bertrauen auf die Rechsidee in der Welt hat wenig Wert.")

(At the National Security League's Annual Dinner, President Coolidge said, "Weak confidence in the idea of ​​law in the world is of little value.")

In looking for the original English version of Coolidge's statement, I found that he said in a letter sent to the Security League Annual Dinner, "I need scarcely tell you how vital I believe it to be in the interests of this country to maintain both the Army and the Navy. Feeble righteousness amounts to but little in this world." The letter said nothing about trusting in world justice; but in a speech at the dinner, his Secretary of the Navy, Curtis Wilbur, did express the administration's hope that eventually humanity would accept a World Court where some international disputes could be settled.

The face on the right doesn't look much like Curtis Wilbur, however. So let's move along.

"Has It Come to This" by Orville Williams for Star Company, ca. June 5, 1924

U.S. cartoonists continued to respond with indignation to Japanese protest against the Immigration Act of 1924 passed by Congress over Coolidge's veto. Orville Williams in the Hearst stable of cartoonists was a reliable critic of all things foreign.

"Keep Your Kimono On" by John Knott in Dallas Morning News, ca. June 5, 1924

The Immigration Act of 1924 drastically limited immigration from southern and eastern Europe (read Catholics and Jews), and prohibited immigration entirely from countries whose citizens "by virtue of race or nationality [were] ineligible for citizenship." Drawing on earlier legislation and a 1923 Supreme Court ruling, that language effectively included all natives of Asia. 

No Asian countries had enough military or diplomatic might to make their opinions of the Immigration Act heard on American shores, except for Japan. Japan was a military and colonial power in its own right.

John Knott's cartoon offers the unique view that the Japanese government did not share in that country's offense taken to the patently racist U.S. law. Yet if the Japanese government had not protested the Act, it is doubtful that it would continue to be a cartoonable issue weeks after it was signed into law.

In fact, Japanese Foreign Minister Matsui Keishirō instructed the Japanese ambassador to the U.S., Masanao Hanihara, to write to Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes the Japanese government's dissatisfaction that "the manifest object of the [section barring Japanese immigrants] is to single out Japanese as a nation, stigmatizing them as unworthy and undesirable in the eyes of the American people. ... I realize, as I believe you do, the grave consequences which the enactment of the measure retaining that particular provision would inevitably bring upon the otherwise happy and mutually advantageous relations between our two countries."

"Unsophisticated in Foregn Diplomacy" by Arthur G. Racey in Montreal Gazette, June 10, 1924

I wouldn't be able to translate Japanese cartoons on the subject, assuming that there were some; but here are a couple cartoons drawn outside U.S. borders.

"Einwanderungs-Gesetz" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, June 22, 1924

Arthur Johnson's cartoons were generally hostile to American administrations in spite of his American heritage. In this case, I think he's seizing the opportunity to twit both the United States and Japan, allies against Germany in the Great War.

"Better Nail Down the U.S." by Winsor McCay for Star Company, ca. June 12, 1924

I don't see a signature on this Winsor McCay cartoon, which I have sometimes interpreted to mean that he drew it at the behest of publisher William Randolph Hearst without entirely agreeing with it. 

Uncle Sam is shown ignoring voices calling to return to a more open immigration policy, to lend financial aid to Europe as it recovered from war's devastation, to "give up our Navy" — and to free the Philippines.

"While We're Giving" by Albert T. Reid in Rutland Herald, June 16, 1924

At this time, talk of liberating the Philippines, an American-governed territory since the Spanish-American War, was coming from the same the Asiatic Exclusion League that had pushed for the Immigration Act. As citizens of a U.S. territory, Filipinos were not barred from coming to the states — a loophole in the Whites Only law.

The Philippines status as a U.S. territory would nevertheless remain unchanged for at least another ten years.

Checking Under the Hood

This week's Graphical History Tour circles back to February, 1924 to catch up on the big news stories of the day:

"Another Victory for the Miners" by Fred Ellis in Daily Worker, Chicago, Illinois, Feb. 15, 1924

First, let's check back in at the violence-prone mining town of Herrin, Illinois, where one Glenn Young and A.J. Armitage had led a series of raids against businesses and private homes where booze was served in violation of the Volstead Act. Young and Armitage were backed by a mob, many of whom admitted membership in the Ku Klux Klan. An anti-Klan group calling itself the Knights of the Flaming Circle rose up to battle Young and his Klan Kohorts; others fighting the Klan were the "Shelton gang" of bootlegging outlaws.

When we last left Herrin in Williamson County, Sheriff George Galligan had called in the National Guard in an attempt to restore order. He sent them home when he thought tempers had cooled, but tempers flared back up immediately. On February 8, pro-klan police officers burst into an anti-klan meeting, and in the violence that ensued, one klansman was killed and another injured. 

"The Unanswered Challenge" by Carey Orr in Chicago Tribune, Feb. 11, 1924

Sheriff Galligan took two police officers into protective custody in another county and called for the National Guard to return. 

After a police constable named Caesar Cagle was shot on a Herrin street and died at a hospital where a wounded anti-klan member was also being treated, klansmen from miles around converged on Herrin, laying siege to the hospital. Firing shots into the hospital, they set up roadblocks around the town, took over City Hall.

Young declared himself Chief of Police and had Herrin Mayor C.A. "Mage" Anderson, Sheriff Galligan, and 38 others arrested for complicity in Cagle's murder. The town council named Carl Nall to replace Anderson at request of the military. A coroner's jury the next day found that Cagle had been killed by members of the Shelton gang.

Young would be charged with "injury to property" and forced to quit his usurped office and leave town. Charges were also brought against klansmen, including some prominent Herrin and Marion businessmen, for firing upon the hospital.

Cartoonist Ellis's declaration of victory would not stand for long. Klan candidates would sweep Williamson County elections in April.

"The Newest State Capitol Decoration" by Roy James in St. Louis Star, Feb. 15, 1924

Meanwhile, in Missouri, the Klan held a rally inside the state capitol. The official who granted the permit for use of the capitol building claimed that he had no idea that the persons who made the request, an engineer with the State Highway Commission and a labor commissioner, were acting on behalf of the Klan. "However," Commissioner of the Permanent Seat of Government Harry Woodruff told the press, "it would have made no difference if I had known the meeting was a gathering of the Klan, for I would not have denied them use of the hall."

Woodruff's protestations of innocence were disputed by Heber Nations, the labor commissioner. According to Heber, Rev. Z.A. Harris, a national representative of the Klan, had heard that "a lecturer for a secret religious organization, speaking in the House chamber two weeks before, had made slurring remarks about the Klan and its principles. I mentioned the request to Mr. Woodruff, who wanted the hall and what for, and he gladly granted it."

According to press reports, a crowd estimated in the hundreds listened to Harris preach on "Americanism and the Ku Klux Klan," calling for limiting immigration "in order to prevent an influx of ideas of the ideas of internationalism."

"Knights of the Double-Crossed" by J.P. Alley in Memphis Commercial Appeal, Feb. 28, 1924

If you've been following these Graphical History Tours, you may recall that the Klan was split between factions led by self-styled "Colonel" William J. Simmons, founder of its 1920 iteration, and the more radical Hirman Wesley Evans, whose supporters dumped Simmons from their leadership. Simmons then founded a rival group, the Knights of Kamelia.

The latest offshoot was the Knights of the Mystic Clan, launched in Atlanta but establishing its headquarters in Kansas City, Missouri. The KMC forswore masks and secrecy, and declared that it "the order is not connected in any manner with the Ku Klux Klan, Hiram Wesley Evans, or William Joseph Simmons."

Like that of the Klan, KMC membership was limited to qualified men who are "white and of the Protestant Christian faith." John R. Jones of Kansas City was elected temporary chair of the splinter group, and chapters were set up in Atlanta; Kansas City; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Tulsa, Oklahoma; El Dorado, Kansas; Durham, North Carolina; and Russell, Kentucky.

I'm finding that by April, KMC headquarters had moved to Muskogee, Oklahoma under the leadership of one H. Tom Kight. In February, 1925, someone claiming to represent the KMC left a letter on the doorstep of the Tallequa, Oklahoma Arrow Democrat — anonymously. "To protect our order and to make our enterprise possible, we maintain the utmost secrecy in our operations."

Their secrecy was pretty darned utmost; I have yet to find any mention of the Knights of the Mystic Clan after that.

Turning now to other major news:

"Every Day Is Washday for Some" by Dorman Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. Feb. 29, 1924

Teapot Dome was not the only scandal coming out of Washington in February, 1924, but it was by far the most prominent. Every day seemed to bring new revelations, including against at least one of the senators making hay of the scandals. Interior Secretary Albert Fall at the center of the Teapot Dome scandal was already out of office; the scandal also ensnared Secretary of the Navy Edwin Denby and Attorney General Harry Daugherty.

"His Nice New Cowboy Hat" by Burt Thomas in Detroit News ca. Feb. 14, 1924

Republican-leaning cartoonists played up the involvement of Pan-American Petroleum and Transport Company founder Edward Doheny in a separate oil leasing deal with Interior Secretary Fall at Elk Hills, California. Doheny was a benefactor of Democratic presidential candidate James McAdoo (McAdieu in Thomas's cartoon), which was enough to fuel a lot of Whataboutism.

"Can't Stem the Flood" by Orville P. Williams in New York Evening Graphic, ca. Feb. 27, 1924

Roosevelt in this cartoon is not FDR, but Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (the son of the late president, obviously). Smoot would have to be Chair of the Senate Finance Committee, Reed Smoot (R-UT), better known for the protectionist Smoot-Hawley Tarriff Act of 1930 that worsened the Great Depression.

"Thank Goodness, They're Not All Like That" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Tribune, Feb. 23, 1924

Finally, amid a flurry of cartoons on the theme of They’re All Crooked (They’re Politicians, Aren’t They?), “Ding” Darling’s stands alone for offering readers a list of government officials he thought they could still look up to.

Darling was an admirer of Herbert Hoover and Agriculture Secretary Henry C. Wallace; he approved of the statecraft of Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes, who did not share the isolationism of many other Republicans. President Coolidge allowed the investigation into the Teapot Dome scandal to proceed without interference, effectively inoculating himself from any taint of corruption.

Setting the Stage for 1924

Our Graphical History Tour now arrives at the presidential election year of 1924.

"Let Me Carry Your Grip" by William Morris for George Matthew Adams Service, Jan. 1, 1924

I wasn't going to use this cartoon since Mike Peterson had; but the scan he used had a blank spot where William McAdoo's mouth and chin are, leading one of his readers to mistake McAdoo (just above 3:00 in Morris's cartoon) for Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Some might have considered Roosevelt, the Vice Presidential candidate on the Democrats' 1920 ticket, presidential timber in 1924, but this was a mere three years after he was tainted by the Newport Sex Scandal from his tenure as Woodrow Wilson's Assistant Secretary of the Navy. A Senate investigation into the affair at the naval base concluded that Roosevelt was "morally responsible" for a pattern there of homosexual activity, entrapment, and intimidation, and thus unfit for public office.

Roosevelt, moreover, had been paralyzed from the waist down since the summer of 1921. Although he continued active behind the scenes in Democratic and New York politics, he withdrew from public life until making the nomination speech for Al Smith at the 1924 Democratic Convention.

McAdoo, on the other hand, was the early leading candidate for the Democratic nomination. McAdoo had the backing of rural interests, prohibitionists, the Ku Klux Klan, and his father-in-law, Woodrow Wilson. His rivals included anti-prohibitionist Al Smith, and Alabama Senator Oscar Underwood, who was prohibitionist like McAdoo but publicly opposed to the Klan.

William Jennings Bryan, just past 12:00 in Morris's cartoon, was a favorite of cartoonists to enter the race, but even he recognized that he was better off cheering and jeering from the gallery.

The 1920 Democratic nominee, James Cox, is the fellow wearing glasses just below McAdoo in Morris's cartoon.

"Hiram Isn't Waiting..." by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune, Jan. 5, 1924

Contrary to the left half of Morris's cartoon, Calvin Coolidge's decision to run for election on his own effectively cleared the field of Republican hopefuls, save for Senator Hiram Johnson of California (just below 9:00 in Morris's cartoon). Johnson, representing the party's Progressives and isolationists, was by all accounts a long-shot candidate.

"He Would Hitch His Wagon to a Star" by Elmer Bushnell for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., Jan. 10, 1924

Elmer Bushnell's cartoon about Johnson encountering difficulty with the Republican Party in Bushnell's home state could easily have been syndicated with the word "Ohio" left out. I include it here because it is the one cartoon I've run across that spells out in those bundles the issues Johnson ran on: Mexico, foreign policy, the veterans' bonus, income tax reduction, farm policy, and staying out of the World Court and League of Nations.

"It's Just Possible..." by Harold Wahl in Sacramento Bee, Jan. 10, 1924

I found only one cartoonist willing to take Johnson's candidacy seriously, even among cartoonists in his home state.

"The Flivver That Flivvered" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., Dec. 29, 1923

Meanwhile, Henry Ford, after a year of toying with the idea of running for the presidential nomination of one party or another, decided in December that Coolidge was a shoo-in to win in November.

"Trying to Pull Some Leap Year Stuff" by Sam Armstrong in Tacoma News-Tribune, Jan. 2, 1924

Sam Armstrong continues his theme from last Saturday's post of marital blisslessness with a harridan bride bearing a striking resemblance to Wisconsin's Republican Senator Bob LaFollette (who might be at 11:00 in Morris's cartoon above). Recognizing as Ford did Coolidge's inevitable nomination on the Republican ticket, LaFollette's presidential ambitions lay as a third-party candidate.

"Just the Usual Presidential Year Log Rolling" by Edward Gale in Los Angeles Times, Jan. 4, 1924

After nearly ten months with the House of Representatives shut down, Congress was finally back in session. Gale's cartoon complains that their work was impeded by investigations of: Prohibition, the Anti-Saloon League, the Ku Klux Klan (more on that next week), the Bureau of Efficiency, the Shipping Board, the Internal Revenue Service, Alien Property Custodian, recognition of Russia, and Governor General Leonard Wood's administration of the U.S. territory in the Philippines. He unfairly includes "investigations" of tax reduction and veterans' bonuses, the very sort of issues Congress was necessarily responsible for.

"Smoked Out" by Harold Talburt for Scripps-Howard News Service, Jan. 16, 1924

Curiously absent from Gage's cartoon is the Senate investigation headed by Thomas J. Walsh (D-MT) into the Teapot Dome Scandal. Walsh publicly called for former Interior Secretary Albert Fall to testify in front of Walsh's Public Lands & Surveys Committee, which Fall had so far resisted.

"Something Must Have Crawled Under There and Died" by Harold Talburt for Scripps-Howard Newspapers, Jan. 5, 1924

Since Gale brought up the Wood administration in the Philippines, here's another Talburt cartoon on that topic. To summarize the issues again from last November, Wood had repeatedly vetoed actions of the Filipino legislature, and his unwelcome meddling in the local police department had provoked his cabinet to resign en masse.

"Isn't That Pretty Strong Medicine..." by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Register, Jan. 4, 1924

Having recognized the Mexican government of Álvaro Obregón Salido only months earlier, the Coolidge administration announced at the end of December that the U.S. would sell arms to Obregón in support of his fight against rebels led by Felipe Adolfo de la Huerta Marcor. While I have found a few cartoons supportive of selling weaponry to the Mexican government, most found the business of arms sales unseemly — including this friend of the Republican administration, "Ding" Darling.

That is Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes behind the pharmacist's counter, and in this next cartoon.

"Hardly Fair to Russia" by Orville P. Williams for Star Co., Jan. 9, 1924

O.P. Williams's cartoon on Coolidge administration's conditions for recognizing Russia's Communist government is definitely an outlier. Aside from those drawing for Socialist journals, every other cartoonist I've seen in this period was either skeptical of or against extending recognition to the Bolsheviks.

In any event, Russia failed to satisfy Hughes's conditions, and the U.S. would not extend recognition to the Soviet government in Moscow until 1933.

West of the Moon

"His Great Adventure" by Elmer Bushnell for Central Press Assn., ca. June 22, 1923

The text in Bushnell's cartoon serves to launch today's Graphical History Tour:

Pres. Harding west bound non political speech making tour - he will visit Alaska - being the third President to leave the U.S. while in office.

"I'm Sure This'll Be a Valuable Trip" by Clifford Berryman in Washington (DC) Evening Star, June 20, 1923

One can argue whether any speaking tour by a President of the United States can ever be truly "non political." Along the way, President Harding's "Voyage of Understanding" made stops in St. Louis and Kansas City, Missouri; Hutchison, Kansas; Fairbanks, Alaska; and Seattle, Washington, touting the postwar economic recovery, and making the case for Prohibition and for U.S. participation in a proposed World Court. 

"Making the Trip for His Health" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. June 29, 1923

Harding also made stops at Yellowstone and Zion National Parks, plus the Oregon Trail and Vancouver, British Columbia — quite an ambitious itinerary for a man not known for being a whirlwind of activity, who had campaigned in 1920 for the presidency from his front porch, and found plenty of time while in office for golf.

Dorman Smith noted that one of the reasons for this trip was Harding's health, and he wasn't being ironic. Washington, D.C. and much of what is now the Lower 48 was hit with a deadly heat wave in late June. The weather in Alaska proved to be of little relief, however; temperatures in Fairbanks reached 94F (34C) during Harding's speaking engagement there.

"The President Seems to Be Building His 1924 Platform" by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune, June 27, 1923

Along the way, Harding touted his administration's record on the issues of the day and his agenda for a second term. To Republican McCutcheon, this was a platform built to appeal to every sector of the country.

"The Jovial Horse Doctor" by J.T. Alley in Memphis Commercial Appeal, June 26, 1923

Democrat Alley countered that all this prosperity was bypassing the agricultural sector. There were a number of reasons for this; I've been remarking on the weather again and again in these centennial observations, and it's because conditions were accumulating for the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. Protectionist tariffs, meanwhile, provoked retaliatory measures from the countries where farmers hoped to export their goods.

"Spring Housecleaning in the White House" by Callaghan for Federated Press, ca. May 10, 1923

Before wrapping things up today, I must remind everyone that the Harding administration was one of the three most corrupt in U.S. history, along with Nixon's and Trump's. The truism that the Teapot Dome scandal didn't break until after Harding's death is belied by this cartoon drawn for the socialist labor press by Mr. Callaghan, possibly working from Minneapolis.

The communists and socialists at Federated Press may have been the only ones paying attention to the Teapot Dome scandal in the spring of 1923, although it was first reported in the Wall Street Journal a year earlier. Albert Fall was Harding's Secretary of the Interior, which took over management of naval reserves at Elk Hills and Buena Vista, California, and Teapot Dome, Wyoming. Fall accepted bribes from his friends Harry Sinclair and Edward Doheny to grant leases for Mammoth Oil Corporation and Pan-American Petroleum & Transport Company to drill for oil in those reserves. 

Callaghan and others accused Attorney General Harry Daugherty of refusing to look into the Wall Street Journal's reports. An independent investigation would clear Daugherty himself of culpability; the suicide of his personal assistant Jess Smith shortly before Harding left on his Great Adventure has left the suspicion that the Justice Department was not entirely clean in the matter.

The other cabinet-level chicaneries alleged in the cartoon were separate from the Teapot Dome scandal. Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover suffered no lasting damage from whatever Mexican Mud refers to (the two countries were exploring closer economic ties that spring). Likewise with Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes; Callaghan may have been making some charge that he somehow profited from U.S. diplomatic intervention in the Coto border dispute between Panama and Costa Rica in 1921. And Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon had turned his banking stocks over to his brother Richard but made enough from his other investments to make him the third-highest taxpayer in the U.S.

"On the Back Porch" by Nelson Harding in Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 22, 1923

What So Proudly We Hailed

In light of the lack of effective options to deal with Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, I offer a remembrance of a diplomatic success story 100 years ago.

The U.S., Great Britain, France, Italy and Japan reached agreement in February, 1922 on the Five-Power Treaty to limit naval build-up. A parallel Nine-Power Agreement (the additional powers being Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands and China) guaranteed that each would respect China's territorial integrity. Furthermore, the U.S., Great Britain, France and Japan agreed that in the event of a crisis in the Far East, they would consult with each other before taking any other action.

"A Record Catch" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Colliers, Feb. 18, 1922

As any student of history knows, those agreements wouldn't last forever; but they remained successful for over a decade. Whatever else the Harding administration is remembered for, this set of treaties are still considered its crowning achievement.

"Ding" Darling's cartoon depicts President Warren Harding and Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes more than satisfied with their catch. "Japanese War Talk Peril" is only partly subdued, apparently.

"Naval Strength" by Clifford Berryman in Evening Star, Washington DC, Feb. 17, 1922

Americans concerned about runaway armament spending lauded the agreements, which were more favorable to the Anglo powers than to Japan. As we noted a few weeks ago, thanks to U.S. eavesdropping on diplomatic cables between Washington's guest diplomats and their home countries, Hughes's negotiators knew what they could get the Japanese to accept.

"Rückkehr von der Abrüstungs-Bescherung in Washington" by Hans-Maria Lindloff in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, February 26, 1922

Skepticism out of Germany of the treaty was only to be expected, but it was not all cheers and congratulations in the U.S., either. Isolationists in the Senate, particularly William Borah (R-ID) and Hiram Johnson (R-CA), promised to be a tough sell.

"Every Where That Mary Went" by John Cassel in New York World, Feb. 25, 1922

Yet even among the men drawing cartoons for rabid isolationist Randolph Hearst, there wasn't much said against the specifics of the treaty. The arguments rested for the most part on a distrust of foreign entanglements.

"Reforming the Sharks" by Harry Murphy for Star Publishing Co., Feb. 22, 1922

To them, U.S. diplomats were not the bountiful fishermen of "Ding" Darling's cartoon, but gullible naïfs wading into treacherous seas, whether they answered to the idealistic Woodrow Wilson or the normalcy-minded Warren Harding.

"Taking Candy from a Child" by Harry Murphy for Star Publishing Co., March 2, 1922

For sheer silliness, no Hearst cartoonist surpassed Frederick Opper. For months, his "Sammy and His Pals" series portrayed England, France and Japan as wantonly imposing their will on the Hughes negotiating team. His Uncle Sam was aware that he was being duped, but seemingly powerless to do much of anything about it.

"Sammy and His Pals" by Frederick Opper for Star Publishing Co., ca. March 2, 1922

 

Hearst's national chain of newspapers made him the Fox News of his day; if Murphy and Winsor McCay were his Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity, then I suppose Opper was Hearst's Greg Gutfeld.

"Sammy and His Pals" by Frederick Opper for Star Publishing Co., ca. March 4, 1922

 

As William Morris's cartoon alluded to at the end of last week's post, there was talk in 1922 of changing the national anthem — or, to put it more accurately, to establish an official one in the first place. Many Americans considered "My Country, 'Tis of Thee" to be the national anthem, but there were a number of rival tunes, including "Hail, Columbia" and "America, the Beautiful." "The Star-Spangled Banner" wouldn't be officially declared our national anthem until March 3, 1931.

One would think, given the anti-British editorial policy Randolph Hearst expressed through his stable of cartoonists, that Star Publishing Company would have been happy to see "My Country, 'Tis of Thee," since it was set to the tune of "God Save the King," kicked off the piano rack. Perhaps that's why Opper's revision, even though it doesn't scan to the same tune, expresses Uncle Sam's feelings exactly.

Noises Off

Last Saturday's centennial retrospective reported on the month-by-month demise of Cartoons Magazine as it was taken over by light fiction magazine Wayside Tales. Today we take a look at the sort of editorial cartoons that your great-grandparents would no longer find in Cartoons Magazine.

"Der Seiltänzer" by "L" in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 1, 1921

And not just because of the salty language. Nor because of the German language; even during the Great War, Cartoons Magazine occasionally printed German cartoons. (I wonder how they would have translated "Eiffelturmspiße.")

"Warren Gamaliel Harding" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 1, 1921

Perhaps because Germany had no delusions that "normalcy" was returning, German satirical publications continued to thrive while American ones withered away. Just the same, German-American cartoonist Arthur Johnson had high hopes for the new U.S. administration as President Harding made good on his campaign promise to keep out of the League of Nations. Johnson depicts the League as a monstrous hybrid of the British lion and French rooster in this cover illustration for Kladderadatsch.

"Der Amerikanische Rettungsring" by Erich Wilke in Kladderadatsch, May 8, 1921

Only a week later, Johnson's fellow cartoonist at Kladderadatsch, Erich Wilke, presented a considerably less heroic depiction of the new president, throwing Deutscher Michel a worthless life preserver. That's a much more recognizable Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes in the back of the lifeboat.

"Off with the Old..." by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. May 24, 1921

It hadn't taken long for U.S. cartoonists to begin showing some sympathy for Germany's post-war plight. Notwithstanding the high anxiety about German-American saboteurs during the war, Americans tended not to harbor the same degree of animosity toward the German people as did the British and French. American vitriol was focused more on Kaiser Wilhelm and family than on their subjects.

"If France Insists on Having Beefsteak..." by Elmer Bushnell for NEA, ca. May 6, 1921

French demands on occupying the Ruhr valley threatened to rekindle the war, and found little support from this side of the Atlantic. For now, however, Germany was unwilling to call France's bluff.

"The Shock-Proof Public" by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune, May 10, 1921

Instead, Germany fought to suppress an uprising of ethnic Poles in Silesia, a mineral-rich and ethnically mixed region that had been part of Germany before the war. A League of Nations-sponsored plebiscite to determine which country the region should belong to narrowly favored Germany, so Poles took up arms in May as the League members dithered. 

"If He Could Only Catch His Tail..." by Elmer Bushnell for NEA, ca. May 23, 1921

Italian, French, and British forces would be drawn into the Silesian conflict, even as rebellion against Britain heated up again in Ireland. As violence in Ireland escalated that May, the IRA killed 15 policemen and burned Custom House, headquarters of the Local Government Board for Ireland.

"The Apt Pupil" by Harold "Hal" Coffman for Int'l Feature Service, ca. May 20, 1921

Hearst cartoonists in particular railed against allowing Britannia and Japan to rule the waves.

"Speaking of Disarmament" by Bill Satterfield for NEA, ca. June 2, 1921

The figure pushing "disarmament polish" on President Harding is Senator William Borah (R-ID), a progressive who proved a thorn in the side of presidents of both political parties.

"Alla Camera Nuova" by Gabriele "Rata Longa" Galantara in l'Asino, Rome, May 22, 1921

As long as we're looking abroad, I don't want to lose sight of political events in Italy between the wars. This month 100 years ago saw Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti call for parliamentary elections. Concerned over gains in popular support for Italian socialists, Giolitti brought fascists and nationalists into his governing coalition. He thought that this would instill a degree of reason and responsibility into the far right. 

Apparently that never quite works.

"The Supply and the Demand" by Harry Murphy for Star Company, ca. May 17, 1921

Mainstream U.S. cartoonists eschewed socialism, and seized every opportunity to predict the downfall of Lenin's Bolshevik government in Russia. But every now and then (primarily in the Hearst fold), someone would notice that the U.S. market might do well to sign the Soviets on as paying customers.

"I Can't Hear You" by Carey Orr in Chicago Tribune, ca. May 30, 1921

By and large, however, Carey Orr had an accurate sense of how Americans felt about foreign affairs in 1921.

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Nachtrag:  I ran across the word Eiffelturmspiße in a book on aerodynamics after posting this. The translation there was "Eiffel Tower spike," which makes a whole lot more sense than what every goddamned on-line translation site gave me.