Killing the goose that laid the golden egg

President Roosevelt and William Jennings Bryan use a big stick and knife—each labeled “publicity of contributions” respectively—to kill the “corporations” goose. Herman Ridder and George Rumsey Sheldon each hold money bags. The United States Capitol building is in the background.

Comments and Context

The remarkable cartoons of W. A. Carson — detailed, informed, always in bright colors — were major attraction of the Utica, New York, weekly Saturday Globe. Invariably on the front page, above the fold, and centered under the paper’s masthead, his cartoons were more incisive than editorial cartoons reflecting current events, yet hewed to an independent stance. The Globe was a regional paper that desired to serve readers of all persuasions.

In this cartoon, in fact, it is well-nigh impossible to gauge the cartoonist’s personal point of view. After a period in American politics, though Muckrakers’ exposures and congressional hearings, and especially heated during the previous four years, both political parties committed themselves to electoral reform.

The reform pledges generally fell in the areas of finance, campaign contributions, and independence from corporations’ influence. President Roosevelt’s public promises, and the Democratic Party’s actual platform, were ringing endorsement of independence from the influence of illicit contributions and favors sought by trust moguls and corporations.

(Not pictured in this cartoon was the embarrassment of the Democrats, whose national treasurer, Charles Nathaniel Haskell, also the governor of the new state of Oklahoma, was forced to resign his position with the national party as a scandal involving Standard Oil money was revealed.)

The Democratic presidential candidate, William Jennings Bryan, wields a butcher knife; and Roosevelt threatens the “goose that lays the golden egg” — corporations’ contributions to politicians — with his iconic Big Stick. They reflect no regrets.

On the other hand, the two treasurers of their respective national committees are depicted as forlorn. Cause and effect: their moneybags are mostly empty. (George Rumsey Sheldon was a banker and, like Roosevelt, a Harvard man. His wife wife Mary Seney was more famed, as the first female president of the New York Philharmonic and a patron of Gustav Mahler. The Democratic Treasurer was Herman Ridder, hastily appointed when Haskell resigned — ironically amid a scandal involving the acceptance of illicit Standard Oil payments).

Whether cartoonist Carson shared the happy attitudes of the Bryan and Roosevelt — significantly, as common during the campaign, Roosevelt, not Republican nominee William H. Taft, was pictured as Bryan’s opponent — or if his attitude mirrored the crestfallen campaign treasurers, is difficult to ascertain. Neither did the Globe‘s superfluous “explanation” beneath the cartoon cartoon elucidate matters; surely this is what Carson intended in his cartoon tableaux.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1908-10-10

Creator(s)

Carson, W. A. (William A.), 1862-

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