Hill, David B. (David Bennett), 1843-1910

Alton B. Parker, David B. Hill, John Sharp Williams, Arthur P. Groman, Richard Olney, and Grover Cleveland ride on a camel labeled “Reorganization” crossing the “Desert of Bryanism.” William Jennings Bryan tries to hold back the camel by the tail, and William Randolph Hearst tries to prevent Bryan from being pulled along toward an “Oasis” labeled “Sane Democracy.”

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Starting around 1902, Puck assayed the Democratic field of possible presidential candidates to run against the incumbent, President Roosevelt. The pack of conservative, “Bourbon,” and “Gold” Democrats — opponents of William Jennings Bryan and a third nomination by him or a follower (such as publisher William Randolph Hearst) — usually included the same faces, reflecting the national political machinations.

David Bennett Hill, as a wolf wearing a sheep skin labeled “Parker Boom,” stands on a bluff overlooking a herd of sheep labeled “Democratic Patronage.”

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Democrat David B. Hill had served as New York’s lieutenant governor, governor, and United States senator, but never as United States president, though not for want of trying, or ambition. He had a peripatetic career, supporting and opposing Grover Cleveland, supporting and opposing William Jennings Bryan, favoring both free silver and the gold standard. It was difficult to determine whether such malleable positions hurt his public support, or was his his attempt to gain support.

Alton B. Parker sits in a chair strapped to the back of David B. Hill, who is carrying him up a narrow, treacherous, rocky trail on the edge of a mountain “to [the] St. Louis Convention.” Hill’s walking stick, labeled “Trickery” and “Peanut Politics,” has been broken and mended. Caption: Parker — I think I’ll get out and walk.

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With the Democratic National Convention only weeks away, and the presidential nomination its main order of business, the dark horse boosted by Puck and other conservative Democrats was looking like a sure bet. Appeals Court Judge Alton B. Parker was the darkest of dark horses: having never served in an elected executive office; without a constituency or party base; and an advocate of few known positions. But, he was not William Jennings Bryan, whose waning power was still dreaded by mainline Democrats.

President Roosevelt appears as a dog in the “Republican Kennels,” with his trainer Mark “Hanna.” In the “Democratic Kennels,” an old woman labeled “Dem. Party” pats Alton B. “Parker” on the head and offers him a biscuit labeled “Political Sanity.” Other Democratic dogs George “Gray,” Richard “Olney,” David B. “Hill,” and Arthur P. “Gorman” labeled “Senatorial Leadership” and “Panama Issue” are kenneled nearby. Hanging on the wall is a picture of “Cleveland” with ribbons labeled “1884” and “1892,” and in the lower left is a cage labeled “Distemper” with William Jennings Bryan as a dog bandaged with “1896” and “1900” sitting inside before a small dish labeled “Free Silver.” In the center is a small dog labeled “Yellow Journalism Willie Hearst.”

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This cartoon appeared in Puck in the second week of February 1904 — five months before the actual Democrat Party presidential nominating convention. Pughe’s cartoon of a dog show mirrored Puck Magazine’s editorial desires, as per the depictions, dignified or mocking, of possibles candidates; and the nature of the labels. Also the expressions of the dogs in the kennel show reliably reflect the confidence of the various candidates. Further, the kind attentions to the otherwise obscure New York Judge Alton Brooks Parker — the eventual nominee, pushed by back-bench conservative Democrats — by the old spinster representing the Democratic Party, is prescient.

An old woman labeled “Democratic Party” stands in the “Democratic Intelligence Bureau” managed by “J.K. Jones” who is sitting behind a desk. She is “looking for help” and taking a good look at several prospective candidates, from left: David B. Hill “No objection to dirty work,” William Jennings Bryan “Used to waiting,” Richard Olney “Old but regular,” Edward M. Shepard “Will do anything,” Alton B. Parker “Neat and quiet,” and Arthur P. Gorman “Willing and obliging.”

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A common theme of the time among political cartoonists, even Democrat cartoonists, is the weak field of national candidates. In Pughe’s variation, this Puck cartoon pictures the old-maid Democrat lady looking for household help — a presidential candidate for the following year.

William Jennings Bryan, wearing the pope’s tiara and holding a scepter labeled “16 to 1,” jumps up and down and stamps his feet in anger, as six men labeled “Cleveland, Whitney, Hill, Gorman, Parker, [and] Olney” stand to the left, laughing.

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Pughe’s cartoon appeared shortly after the mid-term elections of 1902, during which the Democratic Party did not fare well, due in part to the popularity of the new president, Theodore Roosevelt, the continuing prosperity in the country, largely unabated since 1897, and what might be termed a fatigue with William Jennings Bryan. The “Commoner” had been the party’s presidential candidate in 1896 and 1900 and lost badly. His harping on the “16 to 1” free-silver coinage issue was growing thin.

An old woman labeled “Democratic Party” turns a wheelbarrow to dump politicians labeled “Bryan, Olney, Gorman, Hill, Shepard, [and] Johnson” into a sandpit labeled the “Democratic Dumping Ground” where only the feet of other, previously discarded, Democrats are visible.

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What makes this cartoon particularly interesting to students of history is that the cartoonist Pughe was not criticizing Democrats from “across the aisle” or from an adversarial point of view. Puck Magazine was Democratic, and beseeched its own leaders, or moss-bound leaders of recent years, to clean house. Except for Grover Cleveland, there had been no Democratic president since before the Civil War. It is interesting that the cartoonist did not even label the politicians’ issues that failed to excite voters (free trade, bimetallism, anti-expansion), suggesting the leaders themselves had worn out their welcomes. Even Tom Johnson, reform mayor of Cleveland, is among the deplorables in Pughe’s cartoon.

George F. Hoar, Carl Schurz, David B. Hill, and former Massachusetts Governor George S. Boutwell place their “Anti-Expansion Speech” at the feet of a huge American soldier holding a rifle and the American flag, while opposite them Filipinos place guns and swords at the soldier’s feet. Caption: The American Filipinos and the Native Filipinos will have to submit.

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Pughe’s cartoon is a diplomatic portrayal of a rather diplomatic cessation of hostilities and American military withdrawal from the Philippines, where insurrection had raged, with brutality on the “Filipino” and American sides almost from the moment of Spanish surrender in 1898. Senator George Frisbie Hoar (R-MA), the most prominent Congressional opponent of the “pacification” by American troops, had demanded investigation of American atrocities. In 1902 an American Marine was tried for the murder of 11 Filipinos; and an American general was convicted of ordering the death of all males over 10 years old on one of the Philippine islands (he was verbally reprimanded, returned to the United States, and discharged). On July 4, 1902, President Roosevelt ordered the full and complete pardon and amnesty to all Philippine citizens and rebels. This cartoon appeared between the surrender of the last rebel leader and the announcement of United States troop withdrawal.

David B. Hill stands on a platform, speaking to an unseen audience. He holds a paper that states “Jefferson! Jeffersonianism!! Jeffersonian Simplicity!!!” The ghost of Thomas Jefferson is tapping him on the elbow. Caption: “Hold on there, David! – Don’t make me ridiculous! Remember, I was always an Expansionist – and if I were alive to-day I should be doing just as McKinley and Roosevelt have done.”

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David Bennett Hill, the former governor and senator from New York State, was a Democrat whose career seemed defined by his concurrent rise to power, and perennial opposition to, fellow New York Democrat Grover Cleveland. While senator, he was a rare Eastern Democrat who favored bimetallism, one of the reasons that Cleveland came out of retirement in 1892, to thwart Hill’s presidential ambitions. Cleveland won the nomination and re-election and in 1896 supported, though somewhat tepidly, the Populist-Democrat William Jennings Bryan. Through all political apostasies, he found himself having to assert his party loyalties, stating more than once, “I am a Democrat,” which mantra became a feast for cartoonists. In this cartoon by Pughe, Hill’s hyperbolic identification with Jefferson slightly distorts history. Jefferson’s Louisiana Purchase was regarded by the third president as an aberration or at least an evolution, not a revelation: he originally desired to acquire Louisiana itself and the port of New Orleans. France’s offer turned his head. Ironically, it was the remnants of the Federalist Party that opposed the deal, which almost doubled the land area of the United States. The cartoons maintains that Jefferson was a pragmatist, and Hill was not.

William Jennings Bryan and David B. Hill roast a bird over a campfire outside the “Dem. Homestead.” Caption: Dismal Dave and Weary William join in celebrating.

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Democratic leaders William Jennings Bryan, in the middle of his career as a perennial presidential candidate,and former governor and senator from New York, David Bennett Hill, the perennial aspirant for the office, experience a lean Thanksgiving. The two were virtually the only Democrats of national stature as the 1904 elections approached, and in cartoonist Keppler’s view have little to be thankful for. Indeed the Democrats in 1904 would nominate a nonentity, Judge Alton Brooks Parker, and lost the election by record margins.

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.”

Several men, identified as “Hill, Jones, Olney, Clark, Bailey, Shepard, Watterson, [and] Lamont,” carry planks of lumber which are identified as Democratic policies from previous election platforms and proposed new planks. As they construct the new “Democratic Platform,” Puck points to a plank they have forgotten, “Tariff Reform,” which sits on a platform in the background on the right. In the background on the left stands William Jennings “Bryan” holding a “Free Silver” plank of rotten wood. Caption: Puck — You are neglecting the only plank you ever did win with, – and the only one you ever can win with!

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Ever since President Grover Cleveland devoted his Annual Message to downward tariff revision (and the result of high tariffs, government surpluses, which Cleveland regarded as immoral) the Democratic Party was generally the party of low tariffs and free trade. Former Speaker of the House Samuel J Randall was one Democrat who generally favored high tariffs. But the implied point of Keppler’s cartoon is not that the Democratic Party cooled on the issue of tariff rates, but that “new” issues like anti-imperialism and standard positions on civil service reform provided the middle ground between the hoary populism of William Jennings Bryan and the tired arguments for tariff reductions could attract voters. Generally, they did not: the Democrats would lose the 1904 presidential election, to Theodore Roosevelt, by record margins.

President Theodore Roosevelt, wearing his Rough Rider uniform, stands with arms folded across his chest, looking at a hill labeled “David Hill.”

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For decades David Bennett Hill was the bete noir of New York State politics. A loyal and tireless Democrat, he served in many offices and capacities, variously allied with or in opposition to Tammany Hall and, later on the national stage, William Jennings Bryan. Hill was a governor and senator. As Grover Cleveland rose in prominence as reform mayor of Buffalo and governor and the state’s favorite son as three-time Democrat presidential nominee, he basically thwarted Hill’s own ambitions for the presidency. From the 1870s through the ‘teens, New York was the home of a disproportionate number of presidents, vice presidents, presidential nominees and aspirants, and power brokers. President Roosevelt, himself a New Yorker, is pictured by cartoonist Keppler contemplating the hill labelled Hill, in the discussion for the 1904 race, with scant anxiety.

Illustration shows two views of William Jennings Bryan sitting at a desk working on his campaign principles. The lower scene shows Bryan preparing for the 1896 presidential election. To the right are Carl Schurz, Henry Watterson, William Bourke Cockran, Richard Olney, and David B. Hill, all in disagreement with Bryan, each holding a sheet of paper disclaiming his principles. In the upper scene, Bryan has crossed out 1896 and replaced it with 1900, adhering to, and remaining consistent with, his earlier principles. To the right are the same five disclaimers. This time they bow to Bryan and offer only one comment: “We do not believe you will do what you promise to do, and we admire you because we think you are insincere. Hill, Olney, Cockran, Watterson, Schurz.”

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Cartoonist Dalrymple engages in hyperbole — the mother’s milk of many political cartoonists — in characterizing the positions of William Jennings Bryan as presidential candidate in 1896 (e.g., “Down with the Supreme Court”). Yet he was right to depict that fact that Bryan had changed few of his positions four years later when he was re-nominated. His in-house Democratic dissenters of 1896 indeed supported him in 1900 when this cartoon was published week before the election. In fact, three factors had changed: Bryan adopted a severe anti-Imperialist stance that attracted new adherents, his “radical” prescriptions of 1896 slowly were becoming palatable to voters, and four years out of office (“in the wilderness”) had Democrats yearning to support the only candidate in the race. Beyond the characterization of Bryan’s positions, the cartoonist’s point of view is reinforced by his caricature of the candidate — scruffy hair, needing a shave, a rough farmer’s hat.

The Democratic Party platform is in flames with a donkey labeled “Democratic Party” rising from the flames as the mythological phoenix. Eleven Democratic Party members have gathered around the fire to supplicate the supernatural being. Caption: The Democratic Phoenix. — If they’d just keep that Bryan boy from playing around me with matches I wouldn’t have to do this stunt every four years.

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The caption of Keppler’s cartoon is cynical, sarcastic, and true. The Democratic Party had been for years its own worst enemy, in electoral terms. Some of the leading Democratic politicians and journalists praying for the scruffy Phoenix to rise include former cabinet member William C. Whitney, Senator John T Morgan of Alabama, U.S. Representative Bourke Cochran, former Governor David Bennett Hill of New York, Senator Arthur Pue Gorman of Maryland, and Henry Watterson, Editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal. 

Tammany Hall boss Richard Croker, inflated like a hot air balloon, wears a medallion showing the Tammany Tiger and a laurel wreath with a ribbon labeled “Kansas City Convention.” Running up behind him is David B. Hill carrying a spear labeled “N.Y. State Democracy.” The title is a quotation from the Bible: “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18).

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For many decades, following the Civil War, the Democratic Party in New York State was split into factions — usually two, sometimes more. Copperheads (Southern sympathizers) and Union Democrats, Tammany Hall grafters and honest Upstate Democrats, city (New York) vs. rural. Occasional Reform Democrats (Samuel J. Tilden, Grover Cleveland, Abram S. Hewitt) vs. Tammany Hall and/or David B. Hill, governor and Presidential aspirant. In 1900, the reformer and radical William Jennings Bryan was renominated for the Presidency by the Democrats and cast his lot with the Tammany faction in New York instead of the bloc led by Hill, who was by then a former governor and former senator. But, as this cartoon suggests, Hill was as much concerned with New York inter-party rivalries as he was the national campaign.

President Roosevelt is seen leaving a stage carrying a wreath of flowers given to him from the American People for settling the coal strike. A bouquet of flowers from the coal miners is waiting for him backstage. A shadowy figure, David B. Hill, lurks behind the curtain holding a hat labeled Socialistic Coal Mine Plank. Caption: Tragedian Hill – “Hang it; he’s winning all the applause and getting all the bouquets.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1902-10-20

A number of pins in the shape of various presidential candidates are in the “1904” pincushion: David B. Hill; Arthur P. Gorman; Chicago mayor Carter H. Harrison; Cleveland, Ohio, mayor Tom Loftin Johnson; and President Roosevelt.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1902-04-10

A man with a feather in his hat labeled “I’m a Democrat” throws stones at a box labeled “My Policy,” as President Roosevelt looks out from a window of the “White House” in the background.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1902-04-16

President Roosevelt begins his letter to Cecil Spring Rice discussing the presidential election and how Alton B. Parker and the Democratic Party chose to campaign. Roosevelt mentions his plans to send Ambassador to Italy George von Lengerke Meyer to St. Petersburg, and spends the rest of the letter discussing Japan and Russia. The Japanese government treats Americans well, while Russia has treated the United States, England, and Japan poorly. However, Roosevelt believes the Japanese Army groups all white men together and considers such men inferior to themselves, as evidenced by the experience of American military attachés in Japan. The president opines that Russia is the main enemy of Japan, as long as it focuses on China, Korea, and Manchuria. However, if Japan desires to become a maritime power, it could threaten the United States, England, and the Netherlands. Roosevelt concludes his letter by saying, “[W]e must trust in the Lord and keep our powder dry and our eyes open.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-12-27