Pughe, J. S. (John S.), 1870-1909

William II, the German Emperor, interviews J. Pierpont Morgan, who is sitting in a chair aboard the Corsair. William II has a long list labeled “What I want to know” of questions and wishes. Caption: He is granted an interview where others fail.

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The backstory of this cartoon is the visit paid by the American financier J. P. Morgan to the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II. Morgan has sailed his yacht Corsair, with a crew of nearly 70, to England for the postponed coronation of Edward VII. He desired to meet and dine with another European monarch, yet he met in German waters to sound out another possibility. Having recently acquired the British North Star Line, he hoped to establish an international naval cartel if he could acquire or control the German Hamburg-America Line. The kaiser, who with his brother Prince Henry, an admiral, took particular interest in Germany’s fleets, was not interested. Cartoonist Pughe saw humor in turning the situation around — making Wilhelm the supplicant.

A Union soldier from the year 1861 sits on the ground, exhausted from carrying a rifle, his bedroll, and the weight of so much additional equipment. Standing next to him is a soldier from the year 1902 holding a rifle and carrying only what he needs in battle. Caption: Old soldier–So that’s your new uniform. Well, I hope you’ll make as good a record in it as I did in mine.

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Pughe’s cartoon is an obvious reference to the United States Army’s newer uniforms issued at this time. The Spanish-American War revealed many challenges inherent in many standard-issue uniforms, armaments, and gear, some as old as the Civil War itself, as indicated by the cartoon. Heavy old woolen uniforms were impractical, to say the least, in Cuba’s hot and humid tropical summer. There were more reforms than this cartoon suggests. Because of the “embalmed beef” scandal, provisions were subject to stricter regulations. Spanish troops used German Mausers with smokeless gunpowder, putting American troops with “traditional” weapons and powder at a distinct and deadly disadvantage. Such sweeping reforms were ordered by the Army Department at this time.

A man labeled “Candidate for Senate,” holding wads of cash, stands in front of a sign that states “Sale of seats to the United States Senate has been prohibited.” Nearby the “Senatorial Box Office” has been boarded up and locked with a sign indicating “Closed.” Uncle Sam, as a police officer with a night stick labeled “Public Opinion,” is directing the man to the new entrance to the Senate, which is marked by the presence of a “Ballot Box” and a man labeled “Voter” standing next to the box. Caption: Uncle Sam — This way, Sir.

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A slow but steady advocacy of Civil-Service reformers since the 1870s had been the abolition of the Constitutional method of electing senators to the United States Senate; that is, by votes of each state’s legislature, and not popular votes of each state’s citizens. The movement gained adherents, less from the logic of the situation, and more because elevation to Senate often had become a corrupt scheme of influence, bribes, and payoffs. In 1909, Illinois Republican Representative William Lorimer was appointed to one of the state’s senate seats by the legislature, and immediate charges of vote-buying were raised. In 1912 the United States Senate accepted a report of findings and denied Lorimer his seat 10 years after this cartoon’s advocacy. As perhaps the “final straw,” within a year three-fifths of the country’s states ratified the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution providing for the direct election of senators. Today, there is a movement among libertarians to restore the Constitutional Framers’ view that congresspeople and senators need to have distinctive methods of representation.

A donkey labeled “Democratic Party” stares at a dog labeled “Bryan” with the face of William Jennings Bryan, lying on a bed of hay labeled “Nomination.”

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William Jennings Bryan had twice led his party to defeat, in 1896 and 1900, as the Democrat standard-bearer. As such, however, he was still the nominal head of the national party, despite the partisans of former president Grover Cleveland and a scarce few others. In the mid-term elections of 1902 (this cartoon appearing in the midst of that campaign) Bryanites held sway, but poor electoral results, coupled with the immense popularity of President Roosevelt, would disabuse Bryan and his followers of a third straight nomination in 1904. A conservative presidential candidate, Judge Alton Brooks Parker of New York, was nominated for president and state tickets reflected a less Populist tone in platforms. The Democrats lost by record margins in 1904, and Bryan returned in 1908 as presidential candidate.

John Bull, representing “England,” and a line of European rulers with the attributes of Nicholas II “Russia,” William II “Germany,” Franz Joseph I “Austria,” Emile Loubet “France,” Victor Emmanuel III “Italy,” and Alfonso XIII “Spain,” each with a broom, stand on a beach trying to sweep back the wave of “American Commerce” about to crash on their shores.

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This cartoon seems to depict old ladies duplicating the futile resolution of legendary King Canute, who attempted to command ocean waves to recede. In fact the women, representing leaders of world trade, with their brooms and mops, were familiar as “Mrs Partingtons” to readers in 1902. Lost in obscurity today, Mrs. Partington was a comic figure in text humor created by Benjamin Penshallow Shillaber of the Boston Post, and in reprint books. Allegedly his character was inspired by an invented character of the British critic Sydney Smith about a self-absorbed busybody who attempted to mop the Atlantic Ocean from her door during a storm. In Shillaber’s hands, Mrs. Partington became known for silly aphorisms, malaprops, and semi-logical pronouncements. When Shillaber died in 1890, his very famous character died with him, but eulogists declared they would live forever in American culture. The necessity of this explanation suggests the contrary. The main point of Pughe’s cartoon is that by 1902 the United States has become the world’s largest trading nation.

A dejected coal sculpture of a royal figure labeled “Old King Coal” wears robes and a crown which he holds onto his head. In the background are factories burning oil for fuel and spewing thick black smoke which drifts, in the shape of a hand, toward the coal sculpture with the intent of snatching the crown from his head.

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This feast of iconography by cartoonist Pughe also is prophetic. Oil was a relatively new commodity in the United States at this time, but today less than a third of America’s energy is provided by coal.

President Roosevelt puts a rescue boat labeled “National Honor” to sea, carrying lifesaving equipment and an oar labeled “Reciprocity.” Out to sea a ship labeled “Cuba” flounders, or perhaps founders. Roosevelt looks back toward shore at the “Republican Congressional Station” where several men wearing foul-weather clothing await the wreck of the ship and the flotsam to wash ashore.

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A portion of Congressional inaction over the disparate choices to deal with Cuba’s situation subsequent to the Spanish-American War was indeed the variety of proposals and therefore conflicting ways to proceed. In the United States Senate, the Teller Amendment was a compact proposal of seven provisions leading to Cuban independence. American financial interests, particularly the Sugar Trust, applied pressure, especially to Republican Party, their traditional ally. The Cuban political elements and societal infrastructure — more sophisticated than in other acquired territories — asserted itself. President Roosevelt, characteristically, fashioned compromises and set a course, to Puck‘s approval at least for the fact that he acted. The Teller Amendment largely was adopted, Guantanamo was leased, and America assumed a somewhat paternalist position for a time.

Timothy L. Woodruff is chained from behind to rocks labeled “Petty Ward Politics, Dadyism, [and] Guden Job,” making it impossible for him to reach a bunch of grapes on a vine labeled “United States Senatorship” hanging just beyond his grasp. The U.S. Capitol is in the background.

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Timothy Woodruff, New York Lieutenant Governor under Theodore Roosevelt, was one of several New York State Republicans in the 1890s and the first decade of the twentieth century who had competing ambitions within the state (gubernatorial, senatorial, and presidential) and therefore clashed in intra-party squabbles. Governor Benjamin Odell, who was elected governor after Roosevelt — Woodruff being the only New York to serve as lieutenant governor under three different governors, Frank S. Black; Roosevelt; and Odell — sought to remove minor office-holders in Kings County, including a sheriff named Gruden and allies, the brothers Dady, all of whom were tainted with scandal and defied a court order issued by Supreme Court Justice William Gaynor. Woodruff allied himself with that trio, to his discredit, at least in the eyes of Puck. The style of dress assigned by cartoonist Pughe casts Woodruff as a common ward-heeler. Roosevelt’s position regarding Woodruff and Odell was delicate, as both were generally competent and honest, and both were consistently strong supporters of him.

J. P. Morgan, caricatured as a little boy and labeled “Trust Promoter,” blows a bubble labeled “Inflated Values” using “Trust Water” through a pipe labeled “Stock Exchange.”

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As J. P. Morgan expanded his financial empire around this time by purchasing companies and combining them (“trusts”) or arranging vertical organization of whole industries (controlling every step of operations from, say, mining to refining to manufacturing to shipping on land and sea). As he also increasingly controlled or influenced banks, lending, and monetary instruments, he became able to inflate or “water” (weaken) stock prices according to his needs of the moment. Cartoonist Pughe, despite failing to hit the mark with a spot-on caricature of Morgan, depicted this situation — a growing crisis in the economy and financial system, in fact — perfectly. Morgan’s methods helped him acquire U. S. Steel from Andrew Carnegie, attracted the intervention of the government in the Northern Securities case, and in part precipitated the Panic of 1907. Ironically, it was Morgan who was recruited to rescue the economy from that brief crisis; the cartoon’s implication was to be realized — the bubble burst — five years later.

At center, animals read the epitaphs on the gravestones in a cemetery and laugh at the victims of hunting accidents. Several vignettes show attempts to prevent additional deaths of hunters by checking their eyesight, educating them on the difference between the body of a deer and that of a man, wearing a disguise made from a deer hide, dressing in armor, and using an iron-plated boat.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1902-10-29

A man dressed as cartoonists of the day portrayed touts and swindlers is labeled, “Walking Delegate,” and wears sandwich boards that state “Notice to Businessmen – This is to certify that the Labor Trust, like all other Trusts, has been duly Incorporated.” A paper on the fence behind him states “Strike Order.” On the left, in the background, is a factory. Caption: Assume responsibility instead of shirking it.

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“Walking delegates” were roving union organizers and representatives to locals from union headquarters. They invariably were portrayed by cartoonists of the day as corrupt, greedy, selfish thugs; almost always depicted in gaudy clothes and ostentatious counterfeit jewelry. Cartoonist Pughe prods both this strutting walking delegate and industrial moguls as well, to realize that they play each others’ game.

A man labeled “Republican Party” picks up the clothing of a man labeled “Democratic Party” who is swimming in the “Democratic Issue Pond” which is labeled “Socialism, Bryanism, Populism, Free Silver, Anti-Expansion, [and] Jeffersonian Simplicity.” At the upper right is a scene twenty years earlier, in which a man labeled “Democrat” picks up the clothing of a “Republican” swimming in the “Republican Corruption Water.”

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Puck refers to Puck for a history lesson, and it makes a perfectly valid observation based on a cartoon by the senior Joseph Keppler 20 years earlier. Political parties frequently evolve in their positions; it is rather less frequent that two established parties largely trade their beliefs, and in such a relatively short time. It is true that in President Cleveland’s time, the Democratic Party was in many ways the more conservative of the two. After Populism, Bryanism, and reactions to economic ills, the Democrats grew radical. Ironically, under Theodore Roosevelt and the insurgents in the nation’s cities and Progressives in Congress, the Republicans — or those in one wing — quickly absorbed or adapted many of the recent Democratic positions. Also somewhat notable about Pughe’s cartoon is that Puck recognized these shifting trends so early: oftentimes such evolution is clear in hindsight.

A large group of wild and domestic animals sit around a table for the “Thanksgiving Banquet of the ‘Survival of the Fittest’ Club.”

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American cartooning’s foremost animal cartoonist at this time, and until the mid-1920s, was T. S. Sullivant. He drew for Life and, during the period of this cartoon, for Judge Magazine; seldom for Puck. J. S. Pughe was Puck‘s go-to cartoonist for animal subjects, which was a popular genre at the turn of the century.

J. Pierpont Morgan, as a strong man at a circus, attempts to inflate a balloon labeled “Steel Stock” with a pump labeled “Enormous Earnings.” In the background is a crowd of people, some holding papers labeled “Steel Stock.” Caption: A strong man, a strong pump; but no sigh of a rise.

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Sometimes the stock manipulation and monopolist’s control of values backfired. The machinations of J. P. Morgan after his acquisition of smaller steel companies if he might have failed to acquire United States Steel from Andrew Carnegie, and then his top-heavy position in the steel market after Carnegie did sell to Morgan, was the subject of editorial and political commentary at the time that he over-extended his resources. If so, Morgan’s challenges soon were overcome, and not as serious as Pughe’s cartoon suggests.

President Roosevelt appears as a cowboy, on horseback, with Cuban President Tomás Estrada Palma, on foot, driving cattle labeled “High Protectionist, Senatorial Pledge Breaker, [and] Beet Sugar Senator” into the “Reciprocity Corral.”

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The specific context of this cartoon, and the reference to “reciprocity,” is the question of America’s policy regarding sugar, Cuba’s chief export commodity. There were expectations after the Spanish-American War among Cuba’s leaders and provisional government, Cuban sugar growers, the American sugar trust, American sugar-beet growers, and various senators representing conflicting interests. Those expectations and hopes were settled by the Platt Amendment and decisions of President Roosevelt that granted free trade of Cuban cane sugar (no or low import duties imposed by the United States — virtual reciprocity, not that Cuba needed beet sugar) offset by Cuban guarantees of other American commodities and foreign-trade concessions. Cuban President Tomás Palma, once an advocate of annexation, backed this compromise. It sometimes is difficult to remember that Puck was a Democratic journal when reviewing such noble depictions and caricatures as in this cartoon of Roosevelt. Alternatively, of course, history remembers the public’s approval and the popularity of Roosevelt at the time. Noted, also, another phrase of Roosevelt’s that entered the language: the cartoon’s caption “A Strenuous Job.”

A large octopus with the face of Richard Croker sits on top of “N.Y. City Hall” with its tentacles labeled “Tax Department, Fire Dept., Garbage Contract Job, Ramapo Job, Blackmail, Building Dept., Ice Trust, [and] Dock Dept.” A sign on City Hall states “‘For my own pocket all the time.’ R. Croker”

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Richard Croker was the “boss” of Tammany Hall, the New York City Democratic organization, and thus the virtual boss of New York politics. Croker, the successor to Boss Tweed and John Kelly held sway despite occasional and short-lived reform waves, largely by an entrenched system — as an octopus using all of its tentacles — and persuasive control of immigrants. Croker was an Irish immigrant, and at the time of this cartoon, betook his immense ill-gotten wealth to Ireland and England, where he lived in splendor, raised racing horses, and controlled New York as an absentee. Times caught up with him, however: election losses, several scandals such as mismanaging New York’s Ice trust during a heat wave, and another reform wave (the Citizens Union, a taste for fusion tickets of honest citizens, and crusaders like Seth Low, former mayor of Brooklyn and shortly after this cartoon mayor of the consolidated New York City) forced his timely retirement from politics.

A man labeled “Pension Agent” holds a small club labeled “Fraudulent Claims” and shakes his fist at Henry Clay Evans shown as a watchdog wearing a collar labeled “Pension Commissioner Evans,” sitting in front of a building labeled “U.S. Treasury.”

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For decades after the Civil War, the Pension Bureau, a necessary agency established to serve the inordinate number of wounded Union veterans, was also a controversial institution that allowed plunder on a large scale. The Grand Army of the Republic, predecessor of subsequent veterans and lobbying organizations, continually fought for greater benefits, fewer tests of legitimate claims, and against reforms and inquests. Politicians “waved the bloody shirt” (the phrase for appealing to veterans and their families) and funded the Pension Bureau extravagantly. President McKinley appointed Henry Clay Evans as commissioner in 1897, and as a reformer he served until 1902, when President Theodore Roosevelt appointed him Consul-General to Great Britain in 1902.

William Jennings Bryan stands with the Democratic Donkey with bandages labeled “1896” and “1900.” They are watching David B. Hill, sporting a feather in his cap labeled “I’m a New Dem.”, getting into an automobile labeled “The New Democracy” with passengers William C. Whitney, Perry or August Belmont, Jr., and driver Daniel S. Lamont.

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Very seldom did cartoonists depict the Democratic donkey as something that could actually be ridden, or almost so. In Pughe’s cartoon the donkey of two-time standard-bearer William Jennings Bryan has two bad legs: his failed presidential campaigns. The cartoonist seizes upon the opportunity to depict a new-fangled automobile. What likely dismays Bryan is not only the “old versus the new”; three of the four “New” Democrats in the car are industrialists — William C. Whitney, one of the two Belmont brothers, and Daniel C. Lamont. Only David Bennett Hill is the traditional politcian; for two years the former governor aspired to be president — but when he dissented from Bryan’s populism, Hill famously declared “I am a Democrat” (and cartoonists thereafter drew him with a feather in his hat bearing that legend), which is here updated to “I am a NEW Democrat.”

In an urban setting, many men wearing the cap and gown of college graduates are performing a variety of manual labor occupations. Caption: Sixty-eight million dollars were give for colleges last year; – if the mania for college education continues we may soon expect the above state of affairs.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1902-01-22

Rudyard Kipling holds a pen labeled “Criticism” which he is using as a prod to get the British Lion moving in a particular direction. Caption: The British Lion [“]I didn’t mind the others, Rudyard; but I never thought you’d be prodding me!”

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Rudyard Kipling likely was the prototypical British colonial advocate in literature and in public affairs of his day. His feelings were heavily tempered by realism and a recognition that England was overreaching on the world stage, and in good part by faulty administration and training of its military. Toward the end of the Boer War his statements and short stories addressed the weak premises and performances of South African policies. In 1902, three short stories in particular gave voice to his revisionist thinking: “The Captive,” “The Islanders,” and “The Comprehension of Private Copper.” Kipling’s legacy in history does not always reflect his maturing attitudes. It is interesting to note that his friend Theodore Roosevelt, after emerging from the African jungles and a safari of almost a year, delivered his first major speech of several in Africa and Europe, on precisely these points: it was somewhat startling at the time. In Cairo, he lectured British colonial personnel about what he saw as flawed administration; he said, in effect, that England should administer its colonies well, including more to the benefit of the occupied lands, or withdraw.