Your TR Source
William M. Butterfield has found a way to cut out the middle man and move produce around the country for farmers, decreasing the cost of living for all Americans. He hopes to meet with Theodore Roosevelt to get advice and promote the idea he has been working towards for 20 years.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-10-03
Ada Brace Hall expresses to Theodore Roosevelt her concerns about the high cost of living and its impact on middle-class families.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-09-11
Speech delivered at Hartford, Connecticut, on September 9, 1912. Speech regards farmers and European conditions, parcels post bills, securities, cost of living, socialism, progressivism, prisoners’ wages and work hours for wage earners.
Sagamore Hill National Historic Site
1912-09-02
A man, woman, and infant wearing ragged clothing labeled “The American Middle Class” sit on a rock labeled “Opportunity” above the rising waters of “Centralized Wealth” in which sharks are circling. In the background, only the head and shoulders of the Statue of Liberty are visible above the water.
“The Rising Waters” by Carl Hassmann is a masterpiece of editorial-cartooning iconography, and a slight example of period hyperbole. It relied on few labels, and the expressions of the couple and the storm clouds easily conveyed the intended flavor. The spirit of the times believed that corporate abuses and an unregulated economy represented a threat to average Americans and liberty itself.
On the other hand, in the very years of the Roosevelt administrations, American was enjoying unprecedented prosperity. Employment, population expansion, wages, technological innovations, leisure activities — all rose during these years of the century’s first decade. If the “middle class” (a new term at the time) felt discomfited by wealth disparity it was more philosophical — compared to the real problems of the lower and immigrant classes.
Theodore Roosevelt thanks Isidor Singer for sending him a letter from Mr. Schoenfeld. In the letter, Roosevelt reflects upon their recent conversation regarding the high cost of living. Roosevelt expresses his wish to reduce the high cost of living, but is unwilling to blame taxes and tariffs completely for the situation.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1912-07-16
Theodore Roosevelt commiserates with Ada Hall about the rising cost of produce. He mentions that farmers are just as displeased as consumers. He hopes that those with the power to affect change will investigate the issue.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-09-15
Theodore Roosevelt thanks George Emlen Roosevelt for giving him what he wanted and mentions that he has to decrease his expenses.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1915-01-04
President Roosevelt wants the protective tariff platform to cover labor costs both domestically and abroad so that the standard of living for Americans is never threatened.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-05-11
Gifford Pinchot encloses an article he wrote for the Progressive campaign book regarding the relationship between conservation and the cost of living. Pinchot would like a copy of Roosevelt’s letter to Mr. Plunkett on the “Wilson question” for private circulation.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1912-08-15
Lillie Larson sends Theodore Roosevelt a picture of herself and her little brothers. Her father lives on a homestead, while the rest of the family lives in town. They hope Roosevelt will be president again; then the cost of living would not be as high.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-10-29
William Wiggin introduces himself to Theodore Roosevelt as the son of Judge Pierce L. Wiggin and a navy veteran. He is a postal clerk and is currently fifty dollars in debt due to the high cost of living and caring for his invalid wife. Concerned for his future independence, Wiggin asks if he can do something for Roosevelt to earn fifty dollars and start afresh.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-08-21
Frank B. Kellogg urges Senator Nelson to support a revision of the tariff bill that will lower duties. Americans support such a bill, and Kellogg believes that its passage is essential to ensure the continued success of the Republican Party. Kellogg notes that lower duties on raw materials is beneficial to the country, and argues that the wages of laborers have not kept up with the increased cost of living.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1909-05-29
A nonfiction book about determining the average cost of living in the twelfth century in Europe. The first eight pages are included in this record.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-09
On the left hand side of the cartoon, Uncle Sam holds up a “Depart. of Commerce and Labor” blackboard that reads, “cost of living increased 15.5%” A Democratic donkey holds a “calamity” horn and starts to cheer. On the right hand side, Uncle Sam flips the blackboard and hits the donkey on the head. The other side reads, “wages increased 16.6%.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-08-03
A disheveled “wage-worker” reaches for a “high wages” money bag on a shelf and a number of food items on a “provisions” shelf. President Roosevelt looks outside of a window, facing the wage-worker and pointing to the two shelves. His shelf reads, “‘The purchasing power of the average wage has grown faster than the cost of living.’ T. R.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-09-22
A tall man labeled “Consumer” serves as the May pole to a group of chubby girls labeled “Steel Trust, Lumber Trust, Sugar Trust, Wool Trust, [and] Glove Trust” who are winding ribbons labeled “Schedule” around him. He is standing beneath cherry blossoms which spell “Puck.”
Seldom missing the opportunity to employ a pun, the issue marking May Day, the international workers’ day, Puck created a neologism in the caption to Albert Levering’s cartoon: “A Maypolitical Party.”
The hapless consumer — an iconic figured eventually supplanted by the political cartoonists’ average voter, John Q. Public — is strapped, immobile, by the children at the May day picnic. To depict the predicament more clearly, Levering has the “innocent” children as representatives of various trusts that still controlled the prices of many consumer goods in America. Further, the young girls are all chubby, from prosperous families; and the consumer is thin and wan.
A large hand labeled “Protected Interests” crushes with its thumb the dome of the U.S. Capitol labeled “Congress” rocketing into the sky atop a pillar of fire with a devilish figure labeled “Cost of Living.”
One of cartoonist Udo J. Keppler’s favorite icons, employed in many cartoons, was a giant thumb come down from the heavens to quash, prevent, and suppress whatever Keppler as innocent or helpless parties of movements. A master of anatomy, his hands were distinctive and well-drawn (many cartoonists confess to being challenged when called upon to draw hands).
In this case, and despite a lengthy and healthy national prosperity (briefly threatened by a Wall Street panic in 1907), the phrase “High Cost of Living” entered the political lexicon. As a fact and a factor, it was always an aspect of debates in political economy. But the phrase — even “HCofL” in the ‘teens and ‘twenties — seldom left the realms of political cartoons and politicians’ speeches after this time.
A customs officer places a tax stamp on an American heiress. Surrounding vignettes suggest other ways of generating revenue, such as taxing “poodles and other precious pups,” people who tell tall stories, “divorce,” “sidewhiskers,” “amateur elocutionists,” and “rubber plants,” “instead of putting it all over the poor old consumer.” Caption: Some stamp-tax suggestions for raising the wind.
The subject of a federal income tax is almost as old as the Republic itself. The first serious proposals were floated in 1812 as government expenditures rose in the face of a war with England. Similar pressures resulted in a tax on all incomes during the Civil War; imposed in 1862, they were lifted a decade later. The only major Democrat tariff of the late nineteenth century was the Wilson law of 1894, and a tax on incomes was imposed to offset the loss of revenue from lower tariffs.
The courts had declared a federal income tax unconstitutional, so at the dawn of the Taft Administration a political and economic “perfect storm” presented itself. The federal government’s budget was growing exponentially larger as the country expanded its population and modern needs; there was general dissatisfaction with high tariffs, for reasons ranging from high consumer prices to resentment of bloated trusts; conspicuous consumption among the wealthy (and wealthy predators, as characterized by Theodore Roosevelt) fueled a public acceptance of taxes on upper income brackets; and a general trend toward collectivist policies, as in European countries, where governments played — and took — a larger percentage of the public’s business.
President William H. Taft sits on a tree branch labeled “Cost of Living,” which bends lower under his weight, above a smiling man labeled “Consumer” lying on the ground dreaming of the commercial products that soon will be within his reach.
By 1909 the covers, and most of the color and black-and-white artwork, in Puck was of a higher level than in immediately preceding years. Udo J. Keppler, chief cartoonist and son of the magazine’s founder, improved in conception and execution. The emergence and stylistic maturity of L. M. Glackens contributed to the improvements; and the work of of new artists like Carl Hassmann (a brief stint), Will Crawford, Gordon Grant, Albert Levering, and Art Young made the period one of Puck‘s brightest.
Unfortunately and ironically, the fortunes of the magazine — circulation, advertising sales, influence — waned at this time. The reasons are not obvious and can only invite speculation. Many journals were turning toward radical political stances, as Puck did, so it was unlikely that readers, or new readers, were offended. Perhaps the day of political-humor magazines was over. Puck‘s rivals Judge and Life were thriving in great degrees, and they both virtually dropped politics, at least prominently, from their contents. After all, a magazine devoted to one side or other in partisan and political debates automatically risked offending roughly half of its potential audience.
Liberty strides forward, carrying a flaming torch labeled “Revolution” and an American flag, and wearing a phrygian cap with tricolor cockade. She crushes underfoot a scepter and a crown labeled “Plutocracy.” In the background, buildings are burning. Caption: If the tariff farce is continued many years longer.
The April 28, 1909 issue of Puck perfectly illustrated the dichotomy — not quite schizophrenia — between the magazine’s dual courses from this period until its demise as a political-cartoon weekly in 1914. The front-cover cartoon was a general observation about the average consumer’s dreams and expectations of a lower cost of living, and the role of the new president, William H. Taft, in that likelihood.
Puck‘s chief political cartoonist, Udo J. Keppler, however, used the center pages to launch a broadside of almost revolutionary fervor… in fact, forecasting a revolution in America if essential policies continued unchanged.