Your TR Source
Ambrose O. Wright asks Theodore Roosevelt to explain why he would denounce the McNamara brothers and say murder is murder, but provided funds to the defense of William Sylvester Taylor, who murdered William Goebel.
The McNamara brothers were labor activists who were convicted of bombing the Los Angeles Times Building.
This Saturday Review article begins by observing the American penchant for lectures. President Roosevelt’s annual message is one example of a lecture, which the author calls a “sermon.” However, the author suggests Roosevelt does not understand that “there is nothing weighty in [his annual message] but its style.” The author concludes by mentioning the dichotomy of Roosevelt lecturing the rest of the world but letting the American people off.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-12-10
This review of President Roosevelt’s work, Life of Benton, alleges that Roosevelt ends up contradicting his own actions by his words as he criticizes the hostile expansion of the earlier United States, while at the same time driving imperialism in the Philippines in the current day. Roosevelt also delves further into hypocrisy through his mention of Benton’s nomination to commanding general during the Mexican American War, which the author of this piece compares to Roosevelt’s own promotion of Leonard Wood to Major General. Such inconsistencies between Roosevelt the author and Roosevelt the president persist through the book.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-10-29
An article in The London Post notes the change in New York Republicans’ attitudes towards William Randolph Hearst as emblematic of the “dramatic” and unprincipled nature of American politics. Author A. Maurice Low compares statements of Secretary of State Elihu Root during the 1906 gubernatorial race between Democrat William Randolph Hearst and Republican incumbent Charles Evans Hughes calling Hearst an “insincere, self-seeking demagogue, who is trying to deceive the working man of New York,” with New York City Republicans’ current alliance with Hearst’s new Independence League in a likely fruitless effort to defeat Tammany Hall.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-11-25
German Emperor William II, with wings made from swords and handguns, and holding a sword labeled “Absolutism,” stands on a cliff with other “Pillars of My Throne” identified as a soldier labeled “Military Force,” a police officer labeled “Police Persecution” carrying a club labeled “Royal Crusher,” an old man with a magnifying glass labeled “Legal Arbitrariness,” Joseph Pulitzer wrapped in paper labeled “Subsidized Press” and “Reactionary Methods,” a well-dressed man labeled “Privileged Nobility,” and a teacher labeled “Drill in Subserviency.” They are illuminated by a large sun labeled “Divine Right.” The “vision” on the right shows a scene in “Transvaal” with a female figure wearing a Phrygian cap and holding a flag labeled “Spirit of Freedom” rising in the clouds of smoke issuing from productive factories.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1896-01-29
A wealthy businessman with his family boards a steamer “to Europe,” while a porter carries their single bag of luggage. When the family returns home, at the end of their summer shopping spree, the businessman’s pockets are empty, and the porter is burdened with countless bags of luggage reflecting their overseas purchases. Caption: He talks loudly of fostering America’s industries – but he will go to Europe every summer and do his shopping there, to save money.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1895-09-11
In this vignette cartoon, Uncle Sam stands at the center placing money in a box labeled, “To Save the Heathen of Foreign Lands.” Around him are vignettes showing American pastimes of pigeon shooting, cockfighting, boxing, and turkey-grabbing, as well as a lynching. Caption: And yet Uncle Sam is always giving money to “save the heathen.”
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1897-09-08
In this vignette cartoon is a man who firmly believes in observing the Sabbath, as he tells his friends. In the surrounding vignettes, he insists that his Sunday newspaper be delivered earlier, that the gardener put out flowers on the tables and in all the rooms, that the bootblack shine his shoes faster, that his driver be available for the entire day, and that the barber add more chairs so he will not have to wait so long for a haircut on Sunday. Caption: He wants everybody to rest on Sunday, except those who serve him personally.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1895-05-22
This vignette cartoon shows men and women in various social situations where politeness overrides one’s actual emotional response, maintaining decorum and preventing a social disaster.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1898-01-26
Henry Cabot Lodge, labeled “A.D. 1620,” cowers before a Native who is about to hit him with a club around which a paper is wrapped that states “An Act to Prevent the Country from being Overrun by Foreigners.”
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1898-03-30
Print shows at center, Uncle Sam as a policeman attempting to stop a bullfight, calling it a “brutal and degrading sport.” Vignettes surrounding the main image show a “Six Day Bicycle Race” with exhausted riders trying to continue, a “Foot-Ball” game with one football player jumping on another as medical staff carry off an injured player, “Pigeon Shooting,” “Prize Fighting” where the crowd cheers as a boxer gets knocked down, and a “Base-Ball” game where a baseball player is “Assaulting the Umpire” with a bat.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1899-07-12
John D. Rockefeller clings to a cross-shaped statue labeled “Clerical Apologist for Standard Oil” standing on a rock labeled “Hypocrisy” in rough seas labeled “Sea of Public Censure.” The statue is illuminated by rays labeled “Standard Oil Cash” beaming through dark clouds.
There are two related subtexts to this powerful cartoon by Udo J. Keppler; or, rather one subtle theme that was at the time manifested by two public figures.
Puck magazine compensated for its dearth of commentary during the first month of the 1907 Wall Street Panic with acidic cartoons like this. It appears to criticize the established church as much as trust magnates, and the viewpoint seemed justified.
A businessman addresses a group of laborers, explaining to them how important tariffs are to their jobs and that if the reform candidate is elected, then the factory would have to close. On the businessman’s return from a trip abroad, customs officials search his luggage, and he rails against tariff duties and the invasion of his personal property. Caption: Around election time at the shop. On his return from a trip abroad.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1911-01-11
Two cameo scenes are separated by a telegraph pole labeled “Western Union.” On the left is a civic meeting claiming that “We must uphold our Public Morals and Civic Decency” where seated on a stage are businessmen labeled “Flagler, Schiff, Jessup [sic], Depew, Rockefeller, Hyde, Morgan [and] Sage.” On the right are the same men sitting in a room where they are straining to hear the report of the “Annual Statement” regarding “Sundry other profits from our Subterranean wires increase this total applicable to dividends by $5,000,000” over the din of coins spilling from a cornucopia connected to a telegraph pole and overflowing a barrel labeled “Western Union Pool Room Receipts.” Visible through a window are many buildings labeled “Pool Room.”
This cartoon requires explanation beyond the depiction of prominent and greedy business tycoons of the day. In May of 1904, shortly before Ehrhart’s cartoon was drawn, the Western Union Telegraph system, which was an essential element of commerce and communication, curtailed the transmission of race track information, including facilitating gambling transactions.
Western Union received substantial income from this business, but it yielded to pressure from moralists and pressure groups. The telegraph trust had another reason to pull back from its association with gambling houses and betting parlors. In many cities where gambling was legal there nevertheless arose an unholy alliance between betting parlors (particularly of the parimutuel variety), saloons, and telegraph agencies. Western Union increasingly was uncomfortable with its de facto partners.
Uncle Sam holds a paper labeled “Protest against Russian Outrage.” He is standing with his back to a slightly open door revealing a skeleton labeled “Lynchings” and holding a handgun and rope in his closet. He looks at the skeleton, realizing he is caught in a double standard.
Whether lynchings of Southern blacks were actually on the rise in this period — and statistics indicate so — publicity about them was on the rise, in magazines and newspapers (traditional and sensationalist press), in novels and plays, and in solemn political cartoons. President Theodore Roosevelt made a particular goal of his administration to publicize and condemn lynchings, and encourage anti-lynching legislation.
There is a specific context to this cartoon. Only a few months previous, the world recoiled in horror at the Kishinev massacre in the Russian city in Moldova. Approximately 50 murders were committed, and many rapes, all accompanied by vile propaganda campaigns against Jews. It was contrasted to the contemporaneous promise of the Czar to end Antisemitism and other examples of religious prejudice in the Empire.
Theodore Roosevelt offers advice to Samuel C. Price on an article Price wrote and mentions he has over thirty years experience trying to get published. Roosevelt “heartily” agrees with much of what Price wrote in his piece but advises focusing just on the American people. When discussing self-governance, Roosevelt notes vague language used in the Declaration of Independence that highlighted the hypocrisy of American slaveholders in calling for independence.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1915-06-29
A commentary on the character of William Randolph Hearst in relation to how he has used his newspapers to shape public opinion about people in public office and current events. Focuses especially on the political cartoonists Hearst has employed, the editorials featured in his papers, and how he has used his ability to report and shape the news to aid his political efforts.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-10-06