Catching Up, International Edition

By rights, today's Graphical History Tour ought to take us into cartoons from October of 1926. But we still have a couple of international stories to take care of from that September.

We start with the federal election in Canada.

"Definitions" by Douglas H.N. Russell in Vancouver Daily Province, Sept. 11, 1926

We've been following the 1926 campaign, but Douglas Russell kindly reintroduces us to the major parties contesting for power in the above cartoon. 

Arthur Meighen's Conservatives were nominally the incumbent party, but never had a coalition partner to achieve a working majority in Parliament in the three days they were in power. The coalition of William Mackenzie King's Liberals and Robert Forke's Progressives had lost their majority in November, 1925. Labour and other minor parties had more in common with the Liberals or Progressives than with the Conservatives.

"The Liberal Champion Still in the Lead" by Sam Hunter in Toronto Daily Star, Sept. 10, 1926

Most of the partisan cartoons leading up to the vote predicted victory for their favored candidate and defeat for the other side. As election day neared, even the partisan cartoonists had to acknowledge that the vote could tip either way.

"Waiting for the Verdict" by George Shields in Evening Telegram, Toronto, Sept. 14, 1926

Sam Hunter was a committed Liberal, and George Shields was an unyielding Tory. Accordingly, whereas Shields depicts Meighen waiting confidently with John Bull at his shoulder (you surely recall that Canada was a part of the United Kingdom at this time), King sweats nervously, backed by his alleged patron, a scowling Uncle Sam.

"Class Selfishness Versus Canadian Progress" by Arthur G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, Sept. 11, 1926

Arthur Racey was another dyed-in-the-wool Tory, but I find hardly any cartoons of his boosting Meighen. Instead, Racey put out an occasional cartoon critical of Progressive leader Robert Forke. This one attempts to say too much, yet artlessly and without wit, as if it were one of those godawful imitation editorial cartoons extruded by ai.

Where were we? Oh, yes…

The Progressives, with their constituency in the sparsely populated, agrarian plains provinces, ran a consistently distant third to the Liberals and Conservatives, but were indispensable to any Liberal government.

Forke had resigned as leader of the Progressives at the end of June, running instead as a Liberal-Progressive. A number of Albertan Progressives in Parliament also quit the party, switching to the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA) Party.

"The Come-Back" by George Shields in Evening Telegram, Toronto, Sept. 17, 1926

Election Day was September 14. When votes in all the ridings were tallied, Meighen's Conservatives lost 24 seats. Concentrating their efforts on ridings where they stood the best chance of winning, King's Liberals gained 16 seats, despite earning fewer votes overall than the Tories.

Meanwhile, although the leaderless Progressives lost 11 seats, Forke and his Liberal-Progressives picked up eight and the UFA gained nine. Their gains were enough for the Liberals to forge a governmental majority, and King returned as Prime Minister, to the disappointment consternation of the Telegram and its cartoonist.

"Foolish Gosling" by Fred O. Seibel in Richmond Times-Dispatch, Sept. 13, 1926

Moving right along: Coming in too late to be in our August visit there, Fred Seibel came up with one more paternalistic metaphor to explain why the Philippines should remain a colony of the United States. 

A proposal by rubber industry magnates to grant independence to the largely Catholic north of the archipelago while retaining the more Moslem southern islands as an American fiefdom ultimately went nowhere.

"A Noble Ambition" by Fred Seibel in Richmond Times Dispatch, Sept. 12, 1926

Fred Seibel drew this complimentary cartoon about Nancy Astor, Viscountess Astor, a fellow Virginian who was elected to the British Parliament upon the death of her husband, Waldorf Astor. 

Lady Astor was an outspoken suffragist and advocate for education reform, temperance, and recruiting women into civil service. On the other hand, she was an anti-Catholic Nazi sympathizer, so her career  did not survive World War II. For the time being, however, she was quite popular in her riding and back in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

"Everything Bows to His Dominating Will" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. Sept. 21, 1926

Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini survived a second assassination attempt in September. 

Anarchist Gino Lucetti had been hiding out in Marseille after shooting Fascist Alessandro Perfetti during an argument the year before, and getting shot himself . Having crossed the border back into Italy under an assumed name, Lucetti threw a bomb at Mussolini's car in front of the Porta Pia in Rome on the very day Lucetti's trial for the Perfetti shooting was to start.

Mussolini was unscathed, although eight bystanders sustained minor injuries, and Lucetti was quickly captured. Mussolini's response to the incident included a veiled warning to France: "We must put an end to the gentle tolerance of parties capable of such matters. It would be well for responsible governments to take note of this, because otherwise their friendship with the Italian people may be fatally compromised, and we are ready to apply suitable methods for this purpose."

"Hands Across the Mediterranean" by William C. Morris for George Matthew Adams Service, ca. Sept. 13, 1926

Mussolini forged alliances with his fellow fascist dictator, Miguel Primo de Rivera. De Rivera had overthrown Spain's elected republic in 1923, receiving the support of King Alfonso XIII after the fact.

Morris's cartoon portrays not only the friendship of the two dictators, but also the relationship between them and their respective royals, the diminutive figures peering out between de Rivera's and Mussolini's legs.

But let's close the book on that September with some cheery news: 

"Germany's Admission to the League" by Arthur Racey in Montreal Evening Star, Sept. 16, 1926

Germany and France have promised never to go to war again! Hoorah!

I Shall Return

Every so often, the statistics report for this blog informs me of a big spike in visits to my 16-year-old post of R.C. Bowman cartoons about U.S. occupation of the Philippines in 1900. I've always guessed that some professor has that post on the syllabus. 

So, just in case some student clicks on the "Philippines" label in search of some extra credit, I like to keep my eyes open for more cartoons about the archipelago's American colonial period.

"The Little Dog with the Big Voice" by William Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, August 15, 1926

It just so happens that the Philippines were on American drawing boards in August of 1926.

President Calvin Coolidge sent a special commission headed by Colonel Carmi Thompson to the Philippines in late July to report back on conditions there 28 years after the U.S. took the islands at the end of the Spanish-American War.

Philippines Senator Sergio Osmena announced that Coolidge had promised him, "We are going to withdraw from the Philippines, but don't intend to leave you with limited resources. We desire to first assist you in promoting economic development sufficient for your self-support."

"He's Reached the Dangerous Age" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Register, August 6, 1926

Philippine desire for independence was nothing new. In "Ding" Darling's view, Americans were inattentive and indifferent to matters in the nation' far-off colony.

By the way, I'm not quite sure why Ding drew "Ordinary Citizen" and "Public Opinion" as two separate persons, or what relation they are to each other, since Uncle Sam is alarmed over "where our young son is." A throuple, perchance?

"High Time Somebody Was Watching" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Register, August 12, 1926

This cartoon makes a little more sense, even if 28 years is an awful long time to be struggling to get a fish in your boat.

Both cartoons cast (no pun intended) Governor General Leonard Wood, 66, as the person responsible for keeping the Philippines in line. The retired Major General was appointed Governor-General of the Philippines by Warren Harding, having been Governor of the southern, majority-Muslim Moro province during Teddy Roosevelt's administration.

"Rubberneck" by Robert E. Brady in Brooklyn Daily Eagle, August 2, 1926

Not everyone was as disinterested in the Philippines as Ding's Public Opinion appeared to be. U.S. rubber manufacturer Harvey Firestone was convinced that the Philippines were an ideal location to grow rubber trees for the American market, a commodity then almost exclusively contained to British colonies. Firestone urged the Coolidge administration to pressure the Philippine legislature to loosen property ownership laws to allow it to buy up land to grow rubber, perhaps as a prerequisite to independence.

One serious proposal would have had the U.S. annex Mindanao and other southern islands and grant independence to the rest of the Philippines.

"Guess Who'll Be the First Victim" by Jesse T. Cargill for Central Press Assn. ca. August 20, 1926

The Chicago Daily News was skeptical. "The United States, it is safe to say, will not grant independence for the sake of rubber, no matter how many native and American cliques favor such a dicker. The question of reasonable revision of land laws should be decided on its merits. Native interests should be protected, and exploitation of the islands by combines indifferent to principle or good faith should be barred."

"Another Channel Aspirant" by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1926

McCutcheon's cartoon riffs on Gertrude Ederle's just-completed swim across the English Channel, and focuses on concerns that if the U.S. granted independence to the Philippines, the archipelago would soon be taken over by some other world power, such as Japan. There is a paternalistic attitude in many of the American cartoons on the Philippine issue, going back to the Spanish-American War and forward to independence in 1946.

"But I Want to Cross By Myself" by Robert Day in Los Angeles Times, July 30, 1926

"The tyrant is a new role for Uncle Sam to play," opined the Los Angeles Times, "one in which neither our cartoonists nor other people on this continent ever have dreamed of seeing him. But in the childlike mind of the excited Filipino, who clamors for independence as a small boy impatiently demands a huge piece of pie, regardless of whether or not it is likely to agree with him, our Government is as despotic as any of ancient Rome. 

"It seems impossible for any of these purblind people to appreciate the anomalous position they present to the world — the strange spectacle of 10,000,000 trying to get out of the United States, while at the same time more than 10,000,000 Europeans are anxious to get in, but must be denied admission."

"The Interested Party Seems to Be Interested" by Wm. Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, August 21, 1926

"It is not yet demonstrated that the routine resolutions of the Philippine legislature [demanding independence] express the majority opinion," averred the Oakland Tribune. "It is yet to be proved that the Filipinos have 'sufficient political maturity for independence.'"

Indeed, there were leaders of the Moslem minority who preferred governance by the far-off Americans to the prospect of rule by the local Catholic majority, leading the Fort Worth Telegram to conclude: "The United States should not grant independence until the Filipinos have gone through a long period of education and are a united people instead of an artificial union of  intensely hostile elements."

"The Ever-Shortening Fuse" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. August 25, 1926

As crises go, the Crisis in Philippine Affairs didn't capture Public Opinion's very long. Nor did whatever promises President Coolidge might have given Senator Osmena.

The World According to the Daily Worker

Today's Graphical History Tours journeys 100 Aprils into the past, with an eye to some of the leftmost cartoonists in print in the U.S.

Daily Worker was published in Chicago from 1924 to 1958, giving voice to the communists and leftist socialists of the American labor movement. Editorial cartoons and illustrations appeared throughout the newspaper, particularly in the Saturday feature section edited in 1926 by Robert Minor.

Xenophobia is nothing new in U.S. history. Congress was considering a series of bills requiring that all foreign-born workers annually register their fingerprints with the government, report to authorities any time they moved or traveled from one locality to another, and carry a certificate of identification to be shown on demand.

"Thumbs Down" by Maurice Becker in Daily Worker, Apr. 10, 1926

Looking down from the sidelines in Maurice Becker's cartoon are: Fake Labor Leader, Militarist, the Courts, Calvin Coolidge, Andrew Mellon, the KKK, Election Crook, Kept Press, and Rotarian. "Fake Labor Leader" may have been a Daily Worker reference to the American Federation of Labor, which it frequently criticized for not being radical enough; but the AFL was publicly opposed to the alien registry legislation.

Labor unions such as the Machinist Locals 84 and 337 protested that "the majority of workers in the basic industries of this country are of foreign birth, and the proposed bills are clearly aimed at the working class as a whole. ... The intent of the proposed bills is clearly to intimidate the foreign-born workers; to prevent them from joining unions; to prevent them from participating in strikes, and to compel them to accept a status of subjection, forced to do scab labor during times of conflict with employers."

Unions for the Pullmans, painters, decorators, seamstresses, steamfitters, and more from Boston to San Francisco organized "Councils for Protection of the Foreign-Born" to advocate against the proposed legislation.

"The Boycott" by Rollin Kirby (?) in New York Evening World, ca. Apr. 14, 1926

The Daily Worker didn't credit the cartoonist, whom I presume was Rollin Kirby. It also seems to me that the caption doesn't fit the cartoon. I couldn't find anything in the Daily Worker reporting boycotts related to the alien registry bills; I also haven't found this cartoon printed elsewhere. [Update: see D.D. Degg's comment below.]

I did find that the U.S. had deported 55,110 resident aliens between September, 1925 and April, 1926.

"Reviving a Dead One" by William Gropper in Daily World, Apr. 9, 1926

The Democrat-sponsored alien registry bills did not make it to President Coolidge's desk, or to the drawing boards of certain mainstream cartoonists I expected would have opinions about them. Many mainstream cartoonists were more interested in proposals to create exceptions to Prohibition — one of many distractions, according to the communist press, "to get the workers' mind off the real issues."

"So That's What's in the Prohibition Barrel" by William Gropper in Daily Worker, April 25, 1926

Would you have preferred your distraction from the real issues neat or on the rocks?

"Sidetracked" by Fred B. Watson in Baltimore Afro-American, Mar. 20, 1926

The Daily Worker included this Fred Watson cartoon in its April 22 edition with an unnecessarily longer title. The cartoon answers my question of two months ago whether Watson opposed U.S. participation in the World Court, and the Worker's cut line explains that the communist leadership at the newspaper viewed the World Court as a tool of J.P. Morgan and Wall Street bankers.

The Black vote, where it could make its way into the polling place, had been reliably Republican since the end of the Civil War. Although the Anti-Lynching Bill was authored and promoted by a Republican, the repeated inaction on the bill when Republicans held all the reins of power was a sign that the party took Black loyalty for granted.

"America Protects Germany from Sin" by William Gropper in Daily Worker, Apr. 28, 1926

I had serious qualms about including this cartoon because of objections to the Daily Worker editor's decision to mess with it. For some reason, the editor saw fit to remove whatever dialogue Gropper had President Coolidge saying (and possibly also text or symbolism that might have been on the paper in Mr. Businessman's hand), substituting instead the editor's own text as a cut line.

Unless an editor is providing translation of a foreign-language cartoon, that's simply not cool. 

But I did want to include a caricature of Calvin Coolidge besides that barely recognizable one by Maurice Becker above. 

And speaking of Gropper caricatures:

"Mussolini Thumbs the Stub of His Nose" by William Gropper in Daily World, Apr. 24, 1926

On April 7, Violet Gibson, the 50-year-old daughter of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, attempted to assassinate Benito Mussolini. Her bullet nicked il Duce's nose; her gun jammed as she tried a second shot.

Police stopped the crowd from killing her then and there. She probably would have been executed like Mussolini's other three failed assassins but for the British government interceding on her behalf. Gibson was allegedly mentally unstable (she had attempted suicide in Rome the previous year), so Italy deported her to England, where she spent the rest of her days in a mental asylum.

But speaking of womenfolk and guns...

"The Lady Might Get Hurt" by William Gropper in Daily Worker, April 1, 1926

The Daily Worker was highly skeptical of international agreements, such as the Locarno Pact, that did not originate in Moscow.

Have we another example of the Daily Worker editor editing a cartoon? Why would Gropper attach a label to the gun if not to identify what it is supposed to represent? Could this cartoon have been drawn about a completely different topic?

"No Team Work" by Maurice Becker in Daily Worker, Apr. 3, 1926

No such question about Maurice Becker's cartoon here. It does reminds me a lot of the Arthur Racey cartoon that led last week's Graphical History Tour. It is possible, I suppose, that Becker could have seen the March issue of Macleans; I think, however, that this was simply a case of two cartoonists reaching for a common image to illustrate a similar situation.

What does puzzle me is why Becker thought it necessary to label which country in the rowboat was which. I mean, shouldn't a reader just assume that the characters are a bunch of different national leaders? How does knowing who's who matter?

"The Spirit of Locarno" by Viktor "Deni" Denisov in Pravda, ca. Apr. 13, 1926

Soviet cartoonist Deni uses caricature to indicate the nationality of some of the League members in this cartoon: the gentleman sprawled on the floor at left resembles Germany's Hans Luther, and the mustachioed fellow at top right looks like French Prime Minister Aristide Briand. Below Briand are a probable Briton and a likely Japanese, but it hardly matters to whom each butt belongs.

"Glorious Garbage" by Marvin P. "Hay" Bales in Daily World, Apr. 24, 1926

I explain these cartoons because they're 100 years old and make references that have grown obscure over time. The editors of Daily Worker explained this cartoon because they didn't trust readers to catch the subtle clues left by the cartoonist that the skull labeled "The League" is dead and that "Geneva Garbage Co." is a trash can.

At least they left the rather clever "Loco Peace Pact" nickname to stand on its own.

"With Rubber a Dollar a Pound" by Maurice Becker in Daily Worker, Apr. 17, 1926

Every once in a while, U.S. presidents would look into the possibility of granting demands for independence by the Philippines, a U.S. possession taken as spoils of the Spanish-American War at the close of the 19th Century. The Coolidge administration had recently appointed Col. Carmi A. Thompson, commander in chief of the United Spanish War Veterans, to conduct just such an investigation.

Members of Congress raised their objection to Philippine independence on a number of grounds, one being the high price of rubber from the British East India Company. U.S. firms were working to establish rubber plantations in the Philippines to rival the British monopoly.

Philippine independence would come only after World War II. 

"The Imperialist Policy in China," uncredited, in Daily Worker, Apr. 17, 1926

China's future was up in the air after the death of Premier Sun Yat Sen in March, 1925. Various warlords sought to establish their own local fiefdoms. Against the warlords, the Chinese Communist Party and  Nationalist government cooperated in the First United Front, with Soviet backing, until the Canton Coup on March 20, 1926.

The communist captain of the S.S. Zhongshan, with a Soviet naval adviser on board, moved to support a leftist uprising in Guangzhou. Chiang Kai-Shek, then the commander of the National Revolutionary Army, declared martial law in Guangzhou and arrested communists in China's armed services and their Soviet advisers.

"The Helper of Imperialist Thieves" by O.R. "Zim" Zimmerman in Daily Worker, Apr. 10, 1926

The Daily Worker promoted a rather different narrative to the purge of communists from China's National Revolutionary Army; Christian missionaries were hardly a factor in the Canton Coup.

Only from an atheist communist would you expect a Jesus Christ drawn as a Jewish stereotype 100 years ago. (Robert Minor drew the Christ with an even longer hooked nose than in this Zimmerman toon — see page 48 here.) It would be a welcome departure from the auburn-haired northern European Jesus found elsewhere but for the undercurrent of antisemitism tapped into by these cartoons.

"My Gawd, How the Money Rolls In" by William Gropper in Daily Worker, Apr. 5, 1926

And thus with yet one more William Gropper cartoon, we must leave 1926 behind for another week or two, returning to the present day secure in the knowledge that we have come so far since those bad old days.

Riffing on World Affairs

Today's Graphical History Tour takes a quick check-up on the colonial world:

"Getting Down to Cases" by Wm. A. Rogers in Washington [DC] Post, August 1, 1925

When last we checked on international affairs, France had sent its military to help Spain quell a revolt in Morocco. Abd El Krim's Moroccan guerillas had stymied the Spanish army since 1921 in the mountains of Rif, effectively establishing the independent state of Rif and confining the Spanish to scattered fortified positions along the coast.

"And Still He Gets Away" by Wm. Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, August 3, 1925

With the entry of France into the Rif War, the European nations launched all-out war to extinguish the independent Berber nation. 

"Up Against It" by Wm. Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, August 22, 1925

Aside from being satisfied to stay removed from the conflict, U.S. cartoonists were divided in their sympathies. The U.S. had allied with France in the Great War, but France's punitive demands against Germany were widely seen as an impediment to a lasting peace; American impatience for France to repay wartime loans from the U.S. was mounting.

"The Iron Dove of Peace" by Douglas Rodger in San Francisco Bulletin, August 10, 1925

As for American attitudes toward Spain, memories of the Spanish-American War were fading — and the U.S. had emerged victorious anyway, so why hold a grudge? Still, it might be telling that, with no justification whatsoever, we blamed the country for the so-called Spanish flu.

"Take Care" by Winsor McCay, ca. August 28, 1925

On the other hand, Americans viewed Europe as a seat of civilization and Africa as part of a backward, benighted world requiring guidance and oversight by White People.

"One of Those English Jokes" by Tom Foley in Minneapolis Star, August 5, 1925

Meanwhile, did we mention war debts?

"Going Up" by Orville Williams for Star Company, ca. Aug. 6, 1925

In part due to protectionist tariffs and trade barriers in vogue between the World Wars, the U.S. demand for rubber to keep everybody's cars on the road had run up against the British Empire trade policy.

"Rubber-r-r" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. August 17, 1925

As long as we have the Philippines essentially as a U.S. colony, some Americans argued, why not promote rubber production there?

It has been a while since we have visited the archipelago taken by the U.S. along with Cuba and Puerto Rico as spoils of the Spanish-American War over a quarter century earlier. The U.S. occupation quashed initial independence movements, promising Filipino self-determination someday. Someday just got pushed a little further down the road.

In spite of a tide of isolationism, the U.S. had come to appreciate close ties with its colonial territories.

"Let's Do It Thoroughly" by Orville P. Williams for Star Company, ca. July 1, 1925

Just not too close.

This Week's Sneak Peek

It's high time to get back to this story line:

In Saturday's Graphical History Tour, I remarked that William Jennings Bryan's and his supporters' opposition to U.S. imperialism was not entirely altruistic.

The Democrats' 1900 campaign platform "condemn[ed] and denounce[ed] McKinley's Philippine policy for having "involved the Republic in an unnecessary war," and bemoaned the loss of U.S. soldiers' lives. All well and good; then the platform explained that Filipinos were unfit to be Americans:

The Filipinos cannot be citizens without endangering our civilization; they cannot be subjects without imperiling our form of government; and as we are not willing to surrender our civilization nor to convert the Republic into an empire, we favor an immediate declaration of the nation's purpose to give the Filipinos, first, a stable form of government; second, independence; and third, protection from outside interference, such as has been given for nearly a century to the republics of Central and South America. ...

We are not opposed to territorial expansion when it takes in desirable territory which can be erected into States in the Union, and whose people are willing and fit to become American citizens. We favor trade expansion by every peaceful and legitimate means. But we are unalterably opposed to seizing or purchasing distant islands to be governed outside the Constitution, and whose people can never become citizens.

True, Filipinos were also unwilling to become U.S. subjects. But there are reasons why Democrats today do not venerate the memory of three-time presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan.

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.