Getting an eye-opener!

President-elect William H. Taft holds a “cabinet appointment” pitcher in one hand and a “Sec’y of Interior” martini glass in the other. He offers the glass to Walter S. Dickey, who says, “It certainly was a hard old job swinging Missouri for you!” Charles Nagel looks on in horror and says, “Well——!.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

St. Louis was very political, and still one of America’s largest metropolises; and Missouri was an influential state in political, manufacturing, and trade. Once a bastion of the Solid South — and a thorn in the side of President Abraham Lincoln for its changeable loyalties — it broke with electoral patterns and voted Republican in 1904, helping Theodore Roosevelt’s reelection.

When President-Elect William H. Taft began to assemble his cabinet, two his challenges were dealing with one his mentor Roosevelt’s very few requests, that he reappoint James Rudolph Garfield as Secretary of the Interior. Roosevelt considered the son of the slain president James A. Garfield to be an excellent public servant; and, as a favor, he knew that Garfield was not independently wealthy and that he depended upon his government position. Taft, never discussing his decision with Roosevelt or Garfield, did not reappoint him.

Another challenge facing Taft was a traditional matter of patronage — rewarding allies, achieving geographical balance in the cabinet, etc. Charles Nagel was a respected Missouri attorney (the brewery mogul August Busch was a client) and a founder of the United States Chamber of Commerce. He appears disappointed in the St. Louis Republic‘s cartoon about cabinet appointment, but he was appointed by Taft to be Secretary of Commerce and Labor and served from 1909-1913.

The happy beneficiary of the Interior Department’s chief, did not after all receive the nod. It went instead to Richard Achilles Ballinger, fated to be involved in a bureaucratic dispute with his subordinate Gifford Pinchot, over which both lost their jobs. It was an example of presidential ineptitude, ultimately, that wounded Taft.

Therefore the figures depicted in cartoonist Edward Joseph McBride’s drawing represented employment twists and turns neither could have forecast. Their de facto rivalry continued into the 1912 Republican convention when they clashed — Walter S. Dickey a Taft loyalist, and Nagel allied with Governor Herbert S. Hadley and a Roosevelt proponent.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1908-12-17

Creator(s)

McBride, Edward Joseph, 1889-

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