Not so easily found

As he says, “I mean, help me fight Roosevelt!” Joseph Benson Foraker holds up a mask of his face, which says, “Your race has been outraged!” and looks at an African American man. Foraker holds a knife labeled, “Hatred of Roosevelt.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

Ohio has called itself “the Mother of Presidents,” and through the years it has been, at least, the mother of many Republican presidents. Between the Civil War and 1920, many presidents and presidential candidates hailed from Ohio.

The Republican Party was so active and influential in Theodore Roosevelt’s day, that rivalries and factions within the party often were more dispositive of national partisan trends than between states; similarly, factions within the Ohio Republican Party were sometimes more bitter and more consequential than electoral contests against Democrats in the state.

Senator Joseph Benson Foraker illustrated those facts all by himself. He built a power base in the state… from which he fueled bitter rivalries with fellow Ohio Republicans, for instance Mark Hanna, the amanuensis of William McKinley when the latter was a congressman, governor, and president; William H. Taft; and others. The man seemed to revel in personal animus, and one of his long-lasting feuds was with Theodore Roosevelt, on a variety of issues or pretexts.

When young Roosevelt was Civil Service Commissioner, in 1889, he sought to reform politics, curtail the spoils system of filling federal offices on the basis of party and “pay to play” understandings. Foraker opposed Roosevelt and his reforms, and did so publicly. Their relations over the subsequent years were never smooth.

When Foraker took up the cause of black soldiers discharged in the “Brownsville Affair” — after the death and wounding of men outside a saloon near their Army barracks — his motives were widely seen as an opportunity to embarrass the president, as much as being the champion of the soldiers. Published in the prominent newspaper of Ohio’s Republican Party, the cartoon by Harry J. Westerman displays which faction — not Foraker’s — the Ohio State Journal favored.

Westerman was a much-reprinted political cartoonist but was also notable as a comic-strip creator. Among his famous features was The Dinkenspiels, written by George V. Hobart; and his own The Young Lady Across the Way.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1906-12-27

Creator(s)

Westerman, Harry J., 1876-1945

Language

English

Period

U.S. President – 2nd Term (March 1905-February 1909)

Page Count

1

Production Method

Printed

Record Type

Image

Resource Type

Cartoon

Rights

These images are presented through a cooperative effort between the Library of Congress and Dickinson State University. No known restrictions on publication.

Citation