Looking Up Lincoln's Inaugural Dress

Okay, friends: I've spent nearly a month searching for that reported Vanity Fair cartoon of  President-elect Abraham Lincoln borrowing wife Mary Todd's dress as a disguise. And I am hereby officially throwing in the towel.

Our story so far: during Lincoln's pre-inauguration train trip from Springfield, Illinois to Washington, D.C., his security detail headed by Allan Pinkerton reported learning of an assassination plot planned for his stop in Baltimore. 

This is supposed to be a Graphical History Tour, so let's let the cartoonists tell the story:

The Flight of Abraham," cartoonist unknown, in Harper's Weekly, March 9, 1861

It is helpful to understand that the United States didn't have so much a railroad system as it had a lot of disparate railroads that didn't necessarily connect to each other, or even use the same width rails. To get across the country, Lincoln had to get off one train at its station, and get a ride to a station elsewhere in town to get on the next train. One should also keep in mind that the Secret Service didn't yet exist; Pinkerton's agents, then as now, were a private firm.

But don’t ask me to explain that last panel. I got nothing about attacks of Ager or shadows or Lincoln turning into an Edward Sorel sketch.

"The New President of the United States: From a Fugitive Sketch" in Vanity Fair, March 9, 1861

The above cartoon probably represents Lincoln's actual disguise more closely than any other that I was able to find. 

Instead of the long military cloak, however, cartoonists liked to seize upon the tam-o-shanter to draw Lincoln in full Scottish garb.

"The MacLincoln Harrisburg Highland Fling," cartoonist unknown, in Vanity Fair, March 9, 1861 

The episode was first reported in the New York Times — a paper aligned with the Republican cause — and was a public relations disaster for the incoming president.

"What would the nation think of its President stealing into its capital like a thief in the night?" Lincoln had rightly asked as the operation began. The answer, as the covert trip was illuminated in the press, was, "He is a coward."

One newspaper, Baltimore's Sun, declared: "We do not believe the Presidency can ever be more degraded by any of his successors than it has by him, even before his inauguration." Editorial writers and cartoonists of the time had a field day with the rumors that Lincoln had worn a Scotch cap and long cloak as a disguise. The harangues and caricatures stung Lincoln, and he resolved to never again shy away from threats to his life, no matter how real or imminent they may be.

"Prof. Lincoln in His Great Feat of Balancing" by Henry L. Stephens in Vanity Fair, March 23, 1861 

Could this cartoon of Lincoln wearing a kilt have been mistaken by whomever first reported that elusive Lincoln-in-a-Dress cartoon? I cannot be certain. 

The on-line archives of Vanity Fair are likely sourced from bound volumes of the magazine that were sold to libraries and collectors at the time. The Vanity Fair volumes do not include the front cover of any issue, so I can't rule out the possibility that the Lincoln-in-a-Dress cartoon appeared there.

Or on some missing page. That four-panel cartoon at the top of this post originally appeared on page 160 of a volume of Harper's Weekly issues; pages 159 and 160 happen to be missing from the archive at the University of Michigan Library's website.

"Passage Through Baltimore" by Adalbert Volck in Confederate War Sketches, Baltimore MD, 1863

Mockery of President Lincoln over this escapade disappeared from pro-Union publications in the North once Civil War hostilities broke out in April, 1861, but was kept alive by such cartoonists as rebel sympathizer Adalbert Volck. Volck was a German immigrant and dentist in Baltimore who published a series of cartoon pamphlets for distribution in the Confederate states. Three volumes are known to have existed, but only one survived the war.

"Proposed Meeting of Ex-Presidents" by Henry L. Stephens in Vanity Fair, May 11, 1861

Well, I wanted to find you a cartoon of a 19th-Century president in a dress, and here's a Vanity Fair cartoon by H.L. Stephens of every living ex-president at the time. As far as I can tell, misgendering them added nothing to the point Stephens was trying to make, blaming them for decisions leading up to the Civil War.

Including the consistently anti-slavery Martin Van Buren might have been a little unfair. In 1848, the presidential nominees of the Democratic and Whig parties both favored extending slavery into some western territories seeking statehood. Anti-slavery Whigs and Democrats met in Buffalo, New York, joining the abolitionist Liberty Party to form the Free Soil Party, and Van Buren accepted their nomination as the Free Soil candidate for president.

Van Buren didn't get much support from Whig party exiles; the 10% of the vote he received in November came at the expense of Democratic candidate Lewis Cass and helped throw the election to slaveholder Zachary Taylor. Although many from the Free Soil Party later helped found the Republican Party, Van Buren rejoined the Democrats, supporting Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Stephen Douglas in 1852, 1856, and 1860.

But to find a cartoon of Abraham Lincoln in a dress, I had to close the book on Vanity Fair and turn instead to the work of 20-year-old Thomas Nast in New York Illustrated News. It wasn't about Lincoln's Baltimore disguise per se, but it was published the same day as the first three cartoons in today's blog post.

With apologies for not being able to get that eagle into focus, here it is:

"President Lincoln's Inaugural" by Thomas Nast in New York Illustrated News, March 9, 1861

Could this have been the elusive cartoon I was looking for all along?

Hail, Columbia...

Today's Graphical History Tour was inspired by a reader who was curious about the cartoon figure of Miss (sometimes Lady) Columbia.

"America Triumphant and Britannia in Distress" 1782

In the Eighteenth Century, European cartoonists represented the American colonies, later the United States, with a Native American woman, or at least what they imagined Native American women to look like. I’ve seen that personification used in a very few German cartoons as late as 1920; but White Americans preferred seeing their nation represented by White cartoon characters.

European cartoonists were quick to oblige, almost as soon as the ink was dry on Cornwallis’s surrender. “America Triumphant” predates Lady Columbia, but served as a model for her: neoclassical Greco-Roman clothing similar to Brittania’s, plus the liberty cap that would later be the hallmark of revolutionary France’s Marianne.

"Columbia Teaching John Bull a New Lesson" by William Charles, 1813

The name Columbia has been traced to The Gentleman's Magazine's accounts, begun in 1738, of Parliamentary proceedings by Edward Cave. To get around a British law prohibiting accounts of Parliamentary debates, Cave substituted nicknames for persons and places: instead of “America,” he coined the name “Columbia.”

Uncle Sam came along much later. His name originated sometime around the War of 1812, and he first appeared in a political cartoon in 1832. His features evolved from another early cartoon personification of Americans, Brother Jonathan; but the characterization you might recognize only develops around the time of the Civil War. 

"Mistress Columbia, Who Has Been Taking a Nap," in Harper's Weekly, ca. 1860

In general, Brother Jonathan represented the American people, Uncle Sam represented the government in Washington, and Lady Columbia represented the U.S. as a nation. Brother Jonathan could be a wise-ass, but Lady Columbia was always quite serious.

"The Spirit of '61," 1861

Before James Montgomery Flagg painted Uncle Sam wanting you to serve in World War I, Columbia recruited soldiers to come to her defense in the Civil War. I have not been able to discover who created this recruitment poster.

"Uncle Sam's Thanksgiving Dinner" by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly, Nov. 20, 1868

Columbia and Uncle Sam both appeared in this postbellum cartoon by Thomas Nast. She was seated in the foreground between the Black and Chinese Americans at Nast's Thanksgiving table (greatly exaggerating any welcome and promise of freedom and equality the United States offered persons of those two ethnicities).

"The Right Kind of Valentine," in Canadian Illustrated News, Feb. 18, 1871

Columbia had "reciprocity" behind her back in this cartoon in Miss Canada handed her a valentine reading "Freedom of fisheries," a contentious issue between the two nations for years. Curiously, the cartoonist decided that neither Uncle Sam or Johnny Canuck were appropriate for a cartoon about piscine love notes.

"That's a Pretty Chicken" by Joseph Keppler in Puck, 1872

Columbia could register shock and alarm, as in this Keppler cartoon expressing disappointment with proposed civil service reforms.

"Auch eine Tätowierte" by Joseph Keppler in Puck, Nov. 1, 1876

In another Keppler cartoon, "Also a Tattooed Woman" (in the German language edition of Puck), Columbia's shame was laid bare.  tattooed with Corruption, Tammany (New York City's Democratic headquarters), the Crédit Mobilier scandal, Civil War, taxes, Black Friday, Whiskey Ring, Election Frauds, and plenty more. The caption under  indicates that Columbia was not a willing recipient of her tattoos; similarly themed cartoons of Uncle Sam left open the possibility that he might have foolishly submitted to the inkster's ministrations.

"Columbia's Unwelcome Guests" by Frank Beard in Judge, Feb. 7, 1885

Frank Beard drew this version of a more determined Columbia offering a firm KEEP OUT to immigrants arriving on her shores with their strange ideas and drinking habits. It could be your own great-great-great-great grandparents Beard drew streaming out of Europe's sewers. Maybe even Stephen Miller's.

"A Disgusting and Scandalous Condition of Affairs" by Unknown cartoonist, 1899

Here is a cartoon that illustrated the relationship between Lady Columbia and Uncle Sam: she gives the orders to him to do something about the Army beef scandal (meat issued to soldiers in the Spanish-American War with embalming fluid added to it to slow spoilage). Uncle Sam appears slow to act, however; "How long are you going to sit here idle?" she scolds him.

Neither Grainger nor Alamy credit the artist or publication of this cartoon.

"Darned If I Can Have Any Fun" by E.T. Richards in Life, July 5, 1900

After the U.S. victory in the Spanish-American war put the U.S. in charge of Spain's former colonies in the Caribbean and the Philippines, Lady Columbia and Uncle Sam both appear uncomfortable in their new role as imperial powers in E.T. Richards's cartoon.

Come back next Saturday, as we follow the fortunes of Lady Columbia into the Twentieth Century.

2024: Demokratiedämmerung

Lest auld republic be forgot, let's bring it back to mind: 

For lack of a slide-show feature in this here blog, I present here a column of some of my cartoons from 2024. I might have added the cartoon I drew Sunday, I suppose, even though it's not being published until 2025. Perhaps if I remember it a year from now, it will be part of my 2025 retrospective.

So here, at least to jog my own memory, is what the hell we have been drawing about this year:

Toon: Circle Joke

If you spend a lot of time watching cable TV news, first of all, do yourself a favor and stop; and second of all, you will have heard a variety of pundits, academics, and people of the mistaken belief that they should run for president someday, who are weighing in on Why Kamala Harris Lost The Election.

One of the leading theories is that President Joe Biden and those closest to him handicapped her by running for reelection in spite of mounting evidence that his mental acuity had begun to decline. Many of us, myself included, had voted for him in 2020 on the presumption that at 77, he planned to serve one term to repair the damage left behind by The Corrupt Trump administration, then hand leadership of the party over to someone younger.

Instead, he decided to run for reelection, as he put it, "to finish the job."

Which is ridiculous.

The presidency is not a job you're supposed to "finish." Each president does what he or (someday) she can, and turns it over to the next person. The job is never finished until the Republic is.

Donald Berzelius Trump, I fear, may "finish the job."

Anyway, my worry back when Biden announced his 2024 candidacy was that he didn't have confidence that Vice President Kamala Harris was up to taking over the job from him. Or that a Democratic Party primary battle would leave its victor hobbled by constituencies feeling that they were denied their due, or ignored, or unwelcome. Or, in the absence of a primary battle, ditto.

As things have turned out, plenty of Democratic constituencies are complaining about being denied their due, ignored, or unwelcome anyway. The Left complains that Harris tacked to the center instead of wholeheartedly campaigning on their agenda. The Centrists complain that Harris embraced "wokism" and transgender rights and people who say "Latinx."

I saw a scholar on The Daily Show this week promoting his election post-mortem book, arguing to Jon Stewart that Democrats were doomed by their embrace of DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion). He wasn't saying that Democrats should join Republicans in promoting Uniformity, Inequity, and Exclusion; just that they should call DEI something else — as if the right-wing propaganda machine wouldn't devote itself to turning the new name into a dirty word.

Now, I suppose that had Harris listened to the Palestinian rights crowd and condemned Netanyahu's genocidal war in Gaza, it might have been enough to get her over the finish line in Michigan. But it wouldn't have made the difference in any of the other "blue wall" swing states. Vowing to send undocumented alien drug dealers to Guantanamo might have gained her Arizona.

On the other hand, those moves might have helped about as much as affecting a southern drawl helped her in Georgia and North Carolina.

A Post Card from Galena

My husband and I just returned home from an extended weekend in Galena, Illinois to celebrate our anniversary and a birthday with a zero in it. We have usually taken a trip abroad when either of us has a decade birthday, but COVID-19 kept us downsizing our plans again and again this year.

At least we hadn't continued planning, as we had been at one point, on driving down to central Florida. Last week's record-breaking mild weather in the Midwest was far and away better than what Hurricane Eta was affording Floridians.

Galena is a peculiar little town folded in among gullies and ravines on the steep valley walls of the Galena River, which used to be called Fever River, but 19th Century civic leaders decided that its name wasn't a particularly effective selling point for the place. It's the hometown of General and President Ulysses S. Grant, so you can visit his home, and a museum where there is a painting by Thomas Nast of General Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox. 

You can also browse a Main Street crowded with shops selling all manner of bric-a-brac. I found a used book of editorial cartoons by Frank Miller, culled from his entire career's output by his Des Moines Register editors after he died in 1983. I look forward to reading it.

Galena, population somewhere around 3,500, seems to have escaped the attentions of U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy. It has two post offices, the same number that remain within the city limits of the burg of 78,000 where I was raised. We also came across those blue mailboxes in several places around Galena; where I live, you can only find those boxes at the Post Office.

This post comes as a way of explaining, or perhaps excusing, tomorrow's cartoon.

The birthday of my better half comes early in November, which coincides with regularly scheduled elections. For a political cartoonist, taking vacations in early November is like a tax attorney closing shop for the first half of April. But we do it anyway.

As we were about to leave for Puerto Vallarta in November, 2000, I proposed to my editor that I leave him two cartoons: one for use if George W. Bush won the election, and another for use if Al Gore won. He told me to come up with something else, and it's a good thing he did. That election had still not been decided by the time we returned home.

Tomorrow's cartoon was drawn after this year's ballots had been cast, but while only Donald Tommy Flanagan Trump was projecting any winner. I kept to my former editor's advice, and drew a cartoon that would reflect my views, whether the election would have been won by Trump, Joe Biden, or a player to be named later.

Anywho, it's good to be home again, to our own bed, to our own kitchen, and to a television that isn't programmed to tune in to Fox News every time we turn it on.

Faces in the Crowd

The cartoon I posted on Sunday employed caricatures of a number of House Republicans, when I could more easily have drawn a single GOP elephant at a microphone. So why didn't I do that and knock off an hour earlier?

June, 1996 for the UWM Post.

Pardon me if I step back a few years in order to answer that. In 1996, I drew a crowd of (hopefully) recognizable Republicans, grinning smugly, because that made more sense than drawing a single elephant, and was more effective than a bunch of smugly grinning elephants. Behind Bob Dole in this cartoon, mocking GOP claims of having a "big tent" on the abortion issue in spite of the hardline plank in the party platform, stand, from left to right: Dick Armey, Newt Gingrich, Trent Lott, Phil Gramm, Jesse Helms, Gary Bauer, Pat Robertson, and Ralph Reed.

(Since the UWM Post didn't put out any editions that summer, the above cartoon was never published, but I ended up drawing another one a lot like it for them in September.)

in UW-M Post, March 5, 1991

My cartoon of sheepish Democrats at the peak of George H.W. Bush's popularity would have been less pointed if I had drawn a donkey or donkeys among the sheep. (From left to right: Sam Nunn, Bill Bradley, Dick Gephardt, Tom Foley, Al Gore, Mario Cuomo, Lloyd Bentsen, and George Mitchell.)

in UWM Post, September 28, 1989

Which is not to say that every editorial cartoon has to include caricatures of actual politicians. I liked the idea for my cartoon about multiple ethics investigations going on in the nation's capital in 1989, but there weren't enough politicians actually leading one investigation while being the target of another for me to have drawn a bunch of real people.

This idea is not far removed from Thomas Nast's "Who Stole the People's Money? Do Tell. 'Twas Him" cartoon showing easily recognizable members of the Tammany Ring standing in a circle, each pointing fingers at the man to his right. It's a great cartoon that had great impact when it was published and has stood the test of time, even though the real Richard Connolly was not accusing Peter Sweeney, who was not accusing Boss Tweed, who was not accusing James Ingersoll, etc.

for Q Syndicate, June 21, 2004

Here again, I could have drawn specific Republican senators pulling a prank in 2004, but I think this particular cartoon works better this way artistically.

Still, I believe it is useful for cartoonists to hold actual politicians accountable for their stands on issues. Thomas Nast's cartoons would have had little impact if he had tamely drawn generic "City Hall" characters — or comical Tammany Tigers — every week. Likewise, it's all well and good to draw a cartoon highlighting Lindsey Graham's or Matt Gaetz's craptasm du jour; but if one doesn't hold their feet to the fire, the effect is likely to be ephemeral.


We can't all be Thomas Nast, but we can still try.

Your Teeming Masses

Since the Corrupt Trump Administration is now bowdlerizing Emma Lazarus and criminalizing legal immigrants, Stigmaback Saturday takes a wide-ranging look back at the United States's anti-immigrant hypocrisy.

I just bought myself the fifth volume of the comprehensive collection of daily and Sunday "Pogo" comic strips by Walt Kelly. The foreword by Jake Tapper includes this non-Pogo strip Kelly drew in response to the Displaced Persons Act of 1948.

Cartoon by Walt Kelly (in New York Star?), ca. June, 1948

Refugees admitted to the United States under this program were also aided by voluntary social service agencies, accredited by the Displaced Person Commission. Most of these agencies were created by religious and ethnic groups, who gave assurances that the admitted refugees would not become “public charges” and that they, the agencies, would help oversee the resettlement of the refugees.

In spite of being a nation of immigrants, the U.S. has a long history of citizens convinced that immigration got out of hand once grandpa and grandma had stepped off the boat.

I don't have a cartoonist, publication, or date for this cartoon (credit Culver Pictures), but it probably dates from the fin de siècle, and quite possibly Judge magazine.

"Where Is the Blame" by Grant Hamilton in Judge, ca. 1891

The cartoonists at Judge appear to have a long-standing animus against immigrants. The protagonist in Judge Art Editor Grant Hamilton's 1891 cartoon points at a horde of ne'er-do-wells labeled "German socialist," "Russian anarchist," "Polish vagabond," "Italian brigand," "English convict," and "Irish pauper,"  and tells Uncle Sam, "If Immigration was properly Restricted you would no longer be troubled with Anarchy, Socialism, the Mafia and such kindred evils!"

"The Unrestricted Dumping Ground" by Louis Dalrymple in Judge, ca. 1901 or '02

Another Judge cartoonist, Louis Dalrymple, portrays immigrants "direct from the slums of Europe" swarming ashore as so many rats. Italians figure rather prominently in this cartoon; so too does anarchist Leon Czolgosz, represented by the rat with the red bandanna and a dagger labeled "assassination" in its teeth. Looking through the clouds is the president he assassinated, William McKinley. (The real Czolgosz used a gun, but I guess the Socialist rat swiped it from him in this cartoon. To each according to his needs.)

"The High Tide of Immigration" by Louis Dalrymple in Judge, 1903

Dalrymple returned to a maritime metaphor in 1903, widening his paranoia to a more inclusive array of national stereotypes. Now, I'm not saying his anti-immigrant preoccupation was itself a manifestation of mental disease or defect, but as it happens, Dalrymple died of paralytic dementia just two years later, aged 44. Let that be a warning to Stephen Miller.

"Put Them Out and Keep Them Out" by Fred Morgan in Philadelphia Inquirer, June, 1919

Since this here blog has a thing about keeping track of what cartoonists were drawing 100 years ago, let's now skip ahead to 1919. A series of terrorist attacks by communist sympathizers began with several explosive devices mailed to prominent Americans, including Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer and billionaire John D. Rockefeller, intended to be delivered on May Day. A few arrived early and others were not delivered due to insufficient postage. One delivered to a senator from Georgia did explode, injuring his wife; another delivered to the mayor of Seattle was a dud. The rest were intercepted before anyone was hurt.

"An Ounce of Mosquito Netting..." by J. "Ding" Darling in New York Tribune, June 6, 1919

If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. Bombers delivered explosive devices themselves in eight U.S. cities shortly after midnight on June 2, including at the homes of Attorney General Palmer, of judges in New York City, Pittsburgh and Boston, of a Massachusetts congressman, and of the mayor of Cleveland. The Church of Our Lady of Victory in Philadelphia was another target. Two were killed in the New York bombing, one of them reportedly the bomber himself.

"Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary..." by Nelson Harding in Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 8, 1919

Residual panic over bombings of military and port facilities by German sympathizers during the war easily shifted to red hysteria, especially since communism was associated not only with Russians, but with Germans — especially German-American academics and socialists in elected office.

"The Hook" by Bob Satterfield for Newspaper Enterprise Association, June, 1919

Many cartoonists were able to express their condemnation of the bombers without painting immigrants with the same brush, pen or charcoal. But for many Americans, it was taken for granted that immigrants were behind the violence and that sending them back to Europe was the obvious solution — a sentiment the Ku Klux Klan would be able to exploit in the decade to come.

"There Is Some Carpenter Work for Us to Do" by Billy Ireland in Columbus Dispatch, June, 1919

But let us step back another 50 years to close with a more hopeful "Can't we all just get along?" sentiment, from German-American immigrant Thomas Nast.

"Uncle Sam's Thanksgiving Dinner" by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly, November 20, 1869

Why, he even allowed the Irish guy a seat at the table!

Toon: Older and Greyer

The New York Times announced over the weekend that its international edition (formerly the International Herald Tribune) would no longer print editorial cartoons, thus adding Patrick Chappatte and Heng Kim Song to the ranks of unemployed editorial cartoonists. (Chappatte responds here.)

The Times is not alone in kicking its editorial cartoonists to the curb. Just last month, Gatehouse Media fired the Columbus Dispatch's Nate Beeler, Savannah Morning News's Mark Streeter, and Augusta Chronicle's Rick McKee. Once, we roamed the plains in great numbers, but now, there are only some two dozen full-time employed editorial cartoonists left.

In the first half of the 20th Century, the domestic edition of the Times had its own cartoonist in Edwin Marcus; from 2011 to 2016, the Sunday Times featured a cartoon by Brian McFadden after its editors decided to cancel a weekly round-up of four or five cartoons by syndicated editorial cartoonists.

Otherwise, the Old Grey Lady eschewed cartoons. No comics page. No editorial cartoons. The editors clearly didn't understand them, didn't respect them, and didn't like them.

Yet somehow, the Pulitzer prize committee awarded the Times the prize for editorial cartooning last year, in a move that left every editorial cartoonist in the western hemisphere gobsmacked.

Meanwhile, Chappatte's cartoons, in the international edition since 2001, won the Overseas Press Club of America’s Thomas Nast Award for best cartoons on international affairs in 2011, 2015 and 2019. But then, this past April, some anonymous editor decided to run a cartoon by a Portuguese cartoonist that depicted a blind, yarmulke-wearing Donald Trump being led by a guide dachshund with Bibi Netanyahu's face and a Star of David dangling from its collar. Many were offended by the cartoon, and the Times apologized for printing it.

So now the Times is citing that Portuguese cartoon as the reason why it will never print editorial cartoons again. (As Canadian journalist Jeet Heer tweeted, "NY Times prints one awful cartoon & now decides to stop running cartoons. By this logic, the paper should have shut down after its 2002-2003 WMD reporting.") American editorial cartoonists, still smarting over the cancelling of the Sunday round-up, are up in arms.

My above cartoon is based on a cartoon by the great Homer Davenport, which I have variously seen with the caption "No Honest Men Need Fear Cartoons" and "They Never Liked Cartoons." The former is probably more authentic, but the latter speaks to the editorial attitude of the New York Times.

For anyone who needs the refresher course, here's a quick explanation of Davenport's cartoon. On the left is New York City's Democratic Commissioner of Public Works William M. "Boss" Tweed, whose corrupt dealings in the 1870's were the subject of a great deal of investigative reporting, and the cartoons in Harper's Weekly of Thomas Nast. Tweed remarked that "I don't care so much what the papers say about me. My constituents don't know how to read, but they can't help seeing them damned pictures!"

Tried and convicted for stealing untold millions from the public coffers, he fled to Spain, but people recognized him because of Nast's cartoons. He was returned to the U.S. and died in jail a couple years later.

The other guy in Davenport's cartoon is Thomas Platt, the Republican leader of the New York State Senate in the 1890's. Upset by Davenport's cartoons in William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal, Platt had back-bencher Timothy Ellsworth put forth a bill in 1897 to prohibit publication of a person’s portrait or caricature without his/her consent, with penalties of up to $1,000 in fines and a year in prison. The Ellsworth Anti-Cartoon Bill passed in the State Senate, but died without a vote in the House.

Finally, the guy on the right in my cartoon is current New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger. I suppose I could have put any of the Times editors in his place, or, better still, an Old Grey Lady.

As much of a cliché as the newspaper's nickname may be, I don't think I've ever seen an actual depiction of what that Old Grey Lady is supposed to look like. That includes this week's flurry of cartoons by my fellow ink-stained wretches.*

Call it a lost opportunity to personify the Times.

And our times are running out.
________
* Update: The Old Grey Lady shows up in the June 12 cartoon by the wonderful Pat Bagley here.

The Irish Question

"St. Patrick's Day, 1919" by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune,  March 17, 1919

And where would we be afther goin' this glorious Sláinteback Sathairn but the Emerald Isle?

"Give Her a Front Seat!" by Fred Seibel in Knickerbocker Press, ca. Feb., 1919

When we last checked in on century-old events in Ireland, Sinn Féin had just rejected British promises to grant Ireland home rule on Tuesday in return for drafting Irish lads to fight the Bosch today. Riots and repression followed.

"St. Patrick's Day in the Mornin'" by Bill Sykes in Philadelphia Evening Ledger, March 17, 1919

Today we jump ahead one year to find the Great War over, Britain and its allies victorious. Sinn Féin won a landslide victory in the Irish general election of December, 1918, save in Ulster, where the Irish Unionist Party won most parliamentary seats. Sinn Féin refused to join the British Parliament, instead declaring Irish independence in January and setting up its own unicameral parliament called the Dáil Éireann.

"May Make Somebody Sick" by Sidney Joseph Greene in New York Evening Telegram, Jan. or Feb., 1919

Along with an official declaration of independence and a constitution, one of the first orders of business for the Dáil was publication of a "Message to the Free Nations" demanding that Ireland be allowed to make its case for independence at the Paris Peace Conference. The British response was to appoint Field Marshal John Denton Pinkstone French, 1st Earl of Ypres, as "master of Ireland" with complete authority over the island's government.

"A Gordian Knot" by Grover Page in Nashville Tennesseean, ca. Feb., 1919

British intransigence was inevitable, given Irish revolutionaries' collusion with Germany, rioting on Armistice Day, and the assassination of two Royal Irish Constabulary policemen in an ambush on the same day that independence was declared. A diplomatic solution was not to be had. Increasing tension and sporadic violence would result in two years of guerrilla warfare with Great Britain (the Cogadh na Saoirse, a.k.a. the Black and Tan War).

"And the Cat Came Back" by Archibald Chapin in St. Louis Republic, ca. Feb. 1919

Given President Woodrow Wilson's proclaimed ideals of "self-determination of all peoples," there was considerable sympathy in the U.S. for Irish independence, as shown in this selection of cartoons. Even the American cartoonists who portray the Irish as unready for self-rule conceded that it should come to pass sooner or later.

"He's Going to Keep On Till He Gets Them" by William Hanny in St. Joseph News-Press, ca. Feb., 1919

It would have been interesting to see how an anti-Irish cartoonist such as Thomas Nast might have depicted the Irish fight for home rule. Nast never had a kind word for Irish-Americans, persistently drawing them as apish, violent louts; he was, moreover, virulently anti-Catholic throughout his career. (Nast's cartooning career essentially ended in 1892, and he died of yellow fever while visiting Ecuador in 1902; if he had survived another sixteen years, he would have had to reconcile his German heritage with growing anti-German sentiment in the U.S. during the Great War.)

The great "Ding" Darling seemed at this point to be rather ambivalent about Irish self-rule. In our last cartoon today, he makes a joke playing off the apparent attraction among urban Irish-Americans to law enforcement as a profession, but doesn't present the gentleman's proposal as either good or bad per se.

"...Before It Is Too Late" by Jay N. "Ding" Darling in New York Tribune, March 10, 1919

I just don't think the gentleman is quite dressed for the job.