Republican National Convention

President Roosevelt rides out of the “Republican National Convention” with a “vice-presidency” flag. Speaker of the House Joseph Gurney Cannon looks toward him and wears a sign that reads, “Free trade is my pet—”Bob” LaFollette is my ideal—I dearly love the lilly whites—Long live 16 to 1—Down with the canal!—Say, you ought to see the other side!” Caption: Extremity to which Uncle Joe might finally have been driven.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-21

A number of President Roosevelts sit on the train as one Roosevelt wearing a “Republican Natl Convention” sash steps off and greets a woman with a large hat labeled “Chicago.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-19

President Roosevelt attempts to put Secretary of Commerce and Labor George B. Cortelyou on a bucking  “Republican National Committee” horse. “Chicago” can be seen in the background.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-18

All of the attendees of the “Republican National Convention” are President Roosevelt. He can be seen at the “depot,” “headquarters,” “leading motel,” and the “Chicago River.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-19

A sun with President Roosevelt’s face rises over the “Chicago convention” as a rooster dressed like Uncle Sam crows, “Roosevelt!”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-19

President Roosevelt holds a “presidential nomination 1904” paper and rides a Republican elephant with a “Cortelyou halo” that pulls a “campaign fund band wagon.” New York Senator Thomas Collier Platt and Massachusetts Senator Henry Cabot Lodge ride smaller elephants while Secretary of Commerce and Labor George B. Cortelyou holds a “reform in elections” stick. Secretary of the Treasury Leslie M. Shaw and Attorney General and recently appointed Pennsylvania Senator Philander C. Knox are dressed as jugglers. The entire party walks toward the Republican National Convention.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-17

President Roosevelt appears everywhere in the “Republican National Convention.” He holds the gavel to nominate himself as president and is supported by the “Northern States,” “Western States,” “Southern States,” and “Eastern States.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-05-29

A larger-than-life President Roosevelt rides toward “Chicago” and the “Republican National Convention for Teddy” flags, passing childlike William Randolph Hearst and Alton B. Parker, standing on either side of their mother, Dame Democracy.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1903-04-17

A “money power” man holds up a big stick that reads “Hanna for 1904” and is about to strike President Roosevelt who sits at his desk and writes on a “plan of campaign 1904.” A handwritten note reads: “Don’t dare to strike. REL.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1903-12

An “Ohio G.O.P.” elephant rejoices as it sees a hot air balloon with Ohio Senator Marcus Alonzo Hanna’s face filled up by the “presidential main” pipe line but a hot air balloon with President Roosevelt’s face deflated.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1903-12-15

President Roosevelt has his ear up to the telephone with a “private wire to Chicago.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

The point of C. R. Macauley’s perceptive cartoon in the New York World is in the caption, not the drawing itself. The president did “keep tabs” on the nominating convention in Chicago, which ran from June 16 to 19, 1908. During that period, his daybook reveals two meetings in the White House with William H. Taft, as well as meetings with cabinet officers and the evangelist Billy Sunday.

President Roosevelt holds an elephant bag and the Big Stick with a spearhead arrow at its top.

comments and context

Comments and Context

The New York World’s C. R. Macauley has inherited the great Charles Green Bush’s position as political cartoonist, as well as the trademark elements of his standard Roosevelt caricature: the portly shape, an outgrown Rough Rider uniform, etc.

President Roosevelt holds a newspaper that reads, “Roosevelt the people’s choice. Probability that the Chicago convention will stampede to him,” as he pets a “third term” cat. Roosevelt says, “That’s a good pussy–now go ‘way and leave me alone.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

There are two smiles in this cartoon by Joseph Harry Cunningham, and it is probably intentionally challenging to discern whether the cat or President Roosevelt bears a stronger resemblance to the famous Cheshire Cat in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

President Roosevelt holds “that big stick” as he whacks the table on the stage of the Republican National Convention. In the crowd, signs for “Ohio,” “New York,” “Pennsylvania,” “Vermont,” “Kansas,” “Indianne,” “Missuri,” and “Illinois” can be seen. Caption: The next Republican National Convention.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Cartoonist Albert Turner Reid’s vision of the 1908 Republican Presidential Convention was meant to suggest, as per the caption, a nightmare for Democrats — not, as the bare cartoon would suggest, a captive and frightened hall of delegates, nervous eyes and anxious expressions. In fact most Republicans clamored for Roosevelt to break his declination pledge and decide to run again.

President Roosevelt bangs the lectern as he addresses delegates that all look like himself from Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and New York. A messenger dressed like Roosevelt brings him a message. On the wall is a flag that has four large “R’s” and two big sticks.

comments and context

Comments and Context

This cartoon from early in C. R. Macauley’s association with the New York World humorously asserts President Roosevelt’s utter dominance of the Republican Party. As a president he was popular with the public, and he had been a famed celebrity, but control of the party and its apparatus, as suggested by Macauley, was another matter.

William H. Taft stands with a gavel in his hand as the delegates select President Roosevelt as the nominee. In the audience are Secretary of State Elihu Root, Secretary of the Treasury Leslie M. Shaw, Speaker of the House Joseph Gurney Cannon, Senator Joseph Benson Foraker, Vice President Charles W. Fairbanks, and New York Governor Charles Evans Hughes. A balloon in the top right-hand corner shows William Jennings Bryan and William Randolph Hearst holding signs that read, “Gov’t Ownership” and “Socialism” respectively as they step on Minnesota Governor John Albert Johnson.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Whether cartoonist Tyler McWhorter drew this cartoon as a prophecy or a hopeful dream, it was another cartoonist’s speculation on whether President Roosevelt would break his pledge of Election Night 1904 that he would not allow his name to be put into nomination in 1908. With its long caption, it also might have been an illustration for an article, or part of series. In any event the St. Paul Dispatch drawing was pasted in the White scrapbook, and presumably seen by the president.

Responding to remarks like Supreme Court Justice David J. Brewer’s accusation of President Roosevelt playing “hide and seek” with the potential of seeking a third presidential term, an article in the Chicago Daily News reassures its readers that for all his faults, Roosevelt respects the constitution too much to run for a second elected term. The delegates at the Republican National Convention will nominate a different statesman.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1907-11-22

Senator Lodge reports that everything at the Republican National Convention has gone “most admirably,” with the platform remaining largely as it was, and Secretary of War Elihu Root’s speech and Frank S. Black’s nomination speech going particularly well.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-06-23

Senator Lodge agrees with President Roosevelt’s telegram stating that the seating of delegates at the Republican National Convention should be decided on the merits of each case, rather than on compromise. Thus far there have been no dubious cases. Now that Solomon Luna has arrived, Lodge believes it would be unwise for Chairman of the Republican National Committee Frank H. Hitchcock to take another proxy or sit on committee.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1908-06-07

A list of names and phrases, along with their coded translations, to be used to report on the proceedings of the Republican National Convention.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1908-06-30