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The first circular of the Society of American Wars of the United States provides details about the new society, including its establishment, structure, organization, and various qualifications for membership. Additionally, the letter encourages members to urge their Congressional representatives to pass a law which would make illegal any desecration of the American flag.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-01-01
Theodore Roosevelt hopes the delegates to the State Convention of Utah will align with other states to overcome “boss rule and the rule of special interests” to ensure democracy and “the cause of progressive Republicanism.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1912-05
President Roosevelt has heard that Idaho Governor Frank Robert Gooding has received contributions from mine owners to help in the prosecution of the alleged murderers of ex-Governor Frank Steunenberg, and tells Idaho Statesman owner Calvin Cobb that if this is true it would represent “the grossest impropriety.” The government must show that it is a neutral party and is not working on behalf of either the mine owners or the Western Federation of Miners. Roosevelt has previously condemned labor unions sending money to the accused, and just as strongly condemns capitalists sending in money to support the prosecution. He asks that Cobb show this letter to Gooding.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-20
President Roosevelt fears that the number of private and special pension bills being passed by Congress has grown too large. Important matters are being ignored in favor of granting favors. Roosevelt does not want to use the veto power on minor legislation but “the danger line in this class of legislation” is being approached.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-05-11
Elijah E. Knott pleads for William Jennings Bryan to support Theodore Roosevelt and fight for the people’s rights against special privilege. Knott encloses a cartoon calls “Bird of a Feather,” which Knott believes to be expressive of the truth.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1912-03-11
Governor Stubbs requests that Theodore Roosevelt deliver some public speeches to encourage his supporters against the special privileges that are supporting President Taft. The people of Kansas are hoping that Roosevelt can make several stops in their state.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1912-03-07
J. Horace McFarland contradicts a recent statement by Theodore Roosevelt, saying that he both does “have influence, and ought to have influence,” and cannot divest himself of it. McFarland spoke with Senator Elihu Root recently about a treaty concerning Niagara Falls, and has found that Root plans to stick to the text of the treaty regardless of is effect on the waterfall. McFarland expresses his concern about several other legislative topics, and feels that the American Civic Association may need Roosevelt’s help in the future.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-03-02
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward asks permission of President Roosevelt to share a previous letter of his with the Governor-Elect of Massachusetts, Curtis Guild. While she has thus far followed Roosevelt’s wish to keep the letter private, Ward would like to impress some slight political pressure for the anti-vivisection movement, to ensure that the movement gets fair treatment.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-17
A small man labeled “Consumer” is badly bruised after running between two rows of Native Americans labeled “Provision Trust, Ice Trust, Fuel Trust, Butter & Egg Trust, Clothing Trust, [and] Copper Trust” who have beaten him with a sack of “Self Rising Flour” and a “Sugar Cured” ham, a coal scuttle, bundle of wood, a “Gas Meter,” ice tongs, eggs, copper coins, and a bolt of cloth with boots, socks, and gloves attached. Caption: And every year he votes as though he liked it.
“Running the gauntlet,” the practice and etymology of which go back to ancient Greece but became widespread in many world societies in the seventeenth century, provided the starkly visual metaphor for cartoonist Will Crawford in this double-page cartoon. In fact it was a common practice in Sweden, on sailing ships, and as a literary metaphor seemingly before Native American tribes adopted it.
The practice is a punishment traditionally viewed as milder and less dishonorable than flogging or stocks. The accused has to pass through a line of peers on each side who beat him with objects.
A woman labeled “Democracy,” carrying a satchel with papers labeled “Free Trade,” is lamenting being turned out of her home into a shower of torn paper labeled “Protection Sentiment.” The door of “Meh own home” is labeled “Southern Senator.”
Instead of Shakespeare or the Bible, Puck turned for a cartoon inspiration to contemporary, cheap stage melodramas in this cartoon by Udo J. Keppler. The over-dramatic daughter, turned away from her family home in the midst of a paper-blizzard, bemoans her fate.
A baseball game between the “Ultimate Consumer A. C. [Athletic Club]” and the “Monopoly Giants” is underway. A “Giants” ballplayer is sliding head-first into a base and is being tagged out by a “Consumer” ballplayer with a ball labeled “Tariff Reduction.” Although the base runner has not even reached the base, the umpire labeled “Congress” calls the base runner, who winks and points at the umpire, safe. Caption: “He’s safe!”
“Safe” has a double meaning. Besides the baseball context, the Congress–represented by a caricature of Senator Nelson Aldrich of Rhode Island, author of the Payne-Aldrich Act, which raised tariff rates–made things safe for trusts (monopolies), in the eyes of Puck Magazine.
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 a fox hunting scene, a man labeled “Special Privilege” rides on a horse labeled “Congress” through “The People’s Field” labeled “Trade, Individualism, Enterprise, [and] Opportunity.” He is following several dogs labeled “Land Trust, Oil Trust, Coal, Metal Trust, Lumber Trust, [and] Franchise Grabber” in pursuit of a fox labeled “Natural Resource.”
The telling aspect of this cartoon by Udo J. Keppler is that a bloated hunter, “Special Privilege” is in pursuit of the fox labeled “Natural Resources,” and that he rides a horse representing Congress.
In a battle, at a breach in the “Tariff Wall,” “Trusts, Monopoly, [and] Stand Pat” forces are being led by a king labeled “American Protective Tariff League.” They are repelling invaders fighting for “Fair Trade” and “Honest Revision.” Caption: “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more / Or close the wall up with our Standpat dead!”
Carl Hassmann, Puck‘s imported cartoonist not yet returned to Vienna, had drawn a similar cartoon a couple years previously. His earlier center-spread cartoon showed similar knights of the Middle Ages marching forth to do battle with opponents representing corruption and privilege. Unlike that cartoon, which enumerated honorable combatants by caricatures and the journals they wrote and drew for, this cartoon depicts an actual battle royal, battlements breached, and virtually no recognizable faces, or any faces.
A man representing big business exhorts two men labeled “Trusts” to test their strength by hitting a peg shaped like a man labeled “Consumer” with a large mallet labeled “Tariff.” Joseph Gurney Cannon is standing to the left, pointing a baton at the consumer, showing the man with the mallet where to strike. The top of the tower, where the bell hangs, is labeled “Profits.” The U.S. Capitol is just beyond the trees, in the background. Caption: The harder you hit it, the higher it goes.
In this depiction of every carnival’s test-of-strength device, the generic bloated characters representing trusts encourage each other to pound the consumer so as to win prizes: higher profits.
William H. Taft offers a spoonful of “Square Revision” to an over-sized child labeled “Infant Industries,” telling her that if she does not take the medicine, the “Free Trade” bug-a-boo will get her. Hanging on the wall above is a sign that states, “An ounce of revision is worth a pound of cure.”
The advice of President-Elect William H. Taft to American monopolies — that a reasonable downward revision of tariff duties on imported goods would forestall the more radical adoption of free trade or virtual abolition of tariffs — was never tested. When the sixty-first Congress took its seats in March of 1909 it immediately set about a severe increase in duties. This was not expected by the electorate, generally, nor by Taft, who bore much of the criticism.
A runaway pig labeled “The Tariff Issue” drags Joseph Gurney Cannon behind it. They are being chased by John Dalzell, Nelson W. Aldrich, Sereno Elisha Payne, and J. S. Sherman. An overturned cart labeled “Steel Trust” has spilled its contents of steel railroad rails. Andrew Carnegie, wearing a kilt, stands next to the cart waving his hat and gesturing to the congressmen. In the background is a large crowd, some in pursuit, and the U.S. Capitol.
After the Republican party’s sweeping victory in the 1908 elections, the major goal of the party establishment, after the oath-taking of William H. Taft, seemed to be the passage of a tariff bill. It had been a decade since the last revision of import duties (the Dingley Act of 1897), and the tariff was a hot topic in the campaign.
This vignette cartoon depicts how economies of scale determine public opinion. For instance, “no. 9” shows a handful of criminals robbing a citizen on the street. The criminals are considered “desperate and dangerous highwaymen.” In “no. 10,” however, three men labeled “Trust” have Uncle Sam at gunpoint and are “robbing the whole country by the tariff,” yet they “are ‘great industrial and financial magnates.'”
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1897-08-25
Nelson W. Aldrich is pictured as a medieval warrior returned home from battles in far-away lands. He is greeted by a robust, full-bosomed woman labeled “Privilege” with a large money bag hanging at her side, and a child labeled “Infant Industries.”
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1909-08-04
A bloated man labeled “Trusts” holds a gold mining pan holding large gold nuggets, drawn from a stream labeled “Dingley Tariff.” The stream is flowing from the U.S. Capitol building.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1897-08-25