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Francis Hopkinson Smith tells Theodore Roosevelt he will gladly come and shared when he is available. Smith says the news about Woodrow Wilson, Henry Watterson, and George Brinton McClellan Harvey is the funniest political mess right now.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-12
President Roosevelt thanks Judge McSurley for sending him the anecdote, which made him laugh. He jokingly tells McSurley not to let Henry Watterson get ahold of it because he “will die of apoplexy.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-10-09
President Roosevelt celebrates his forty-ninth birthday with a variety of friends. In the upper left hand corner at the piano are New York Governor Charles Evans Hughes and Thomas Fortune Ryan singing, “Oh let us be joyful.” Booker T. Washington tells Henry Watterson, “Henry, I hope you’ll come down and visit me at Tuskegee.” Senator Joseph Benson Foraker says to Secretary of War William H. Taft, “I heard a good story today, Will.” Speaker of the House Joseph Gurney Cannon and Vice President Charles W. Fairbanks look at a picture of George Washington, and Fairbanks says, “That picture makes me sad. It reminds me of cherries.” William Randolph Hearst, James Roscoe Day, and Secretary of State Elihu Root look at a book of “Snapshots in New York.” William Jennings Bryan and Grover Cleveland play a game of checkers, and Bryan says, “After you, Grover.” J. Pierpont Morgan watches over the game with his hand on Bryan’s back. Henry Huttleston Rogers, F. Augustus Heinze, and Thomas William Lawson sit together. Lawson says, “Rogers, my boy, you must come over to Boston and visit me.” John D. Rockefeller points at Kenesaw Mountain Landis’s chest while President Roosevelt presents a bouquet to James J. Hill as William J. Long looks on. Finally, James T. Harahan, Edward Henry Harriman, and Stuyvesant Fish read “Snap Shots Along the Illinois Central.” Harriman remarks, “Very nice album, Stuyvesant, is it not?”
There are contexts behind this cartoon by John T. McCutcheon of The Chicago Tribune that might not be apparent to modern researchers. The first is somewhat evident by reading the dialog balloons between figures in the pairings or clusters. Almost appropriate for an April Fool’s cartoon instead of something closer to Halloween is the ironic juxtaposition in every case — political opponents or business rivals exchanging niceties. In fact, insights might be gained by reading the nature of their “about-face” encounters.
In one circle, President Roosevelt holds a box labeled, “Nobel Peace Prize.” In another, Andrew Carnegie cuts a paper labeled “Inheritance” that is divided in half. One side reads, “This piece is for the children,” and the other reads, “This piece is to be returned to the ‘community.'” In the last circle, Henry Watterson faces Roosevelt and holds a bag with a tag, “To Europe,” and a paper sticking out that says “T.R. is all right.” Two men are outside the circles with a paper that says, “We got ours,” while a government clerk looks through a telescope at the number “20%.”
This genre cartoon by Jack H. Smith was typical of drawings many newspapers and magazines produced at the time — weekly or monthly pictorial round-ups of recent news events; not commentary or advocacy, but summaries.
Smith’s unfortunately imprecise conceptions again challenge readers of this drawing. President Roosevelt had indeed received the Nobel Prize for Peace (months after the award’s announcement) at this time; Andrew Carnegie, possibly the world’s richest man after selling his steel businesses to J. P. Morgan, announced that he would donate all of his fortune, except for nominal inheritances, to charity and various causes; and aspirants for the 1908 presidential nomination learned of Roosevelt’s firm intention to back another Republican, Secretary of War William H. Taft. Why Smith would depict them smiling is an example of the limited talents he employed.
In one vignette, Henry Gassaway Davis puts his hand on West Virginia Senator Stephen B. Elkins’s shoulder. Caption: Mr. Davis—That it’s all in the family. In the second, an elephant holds President Roosevelt’s hold “to victory.” Caption: G.O.P.—That it had a strenuous leader. In the third, William Jennings Bryan sits by a grave with a headstone that reads, “Safe & Sane Democrat 1904.” Caption: Mr. Bryan—That it wasn’t his friends. In the fourth, Missouri Senator Francis Marion Cockrell stands by “national esteem” wreaths outside the “White House.” Caption: Mr. Cockrell—That it’s an ill wind, etc. In the fifth, Henry Watterson sits in a rocking chair on a boat bound for Europe. Caption: Mr. Watterson—That there’s another country. In the sixth, a badly beaten donkey stands up by a sign that reads, “Under no circumstances will I again be a candidate for the presidency. T. Roosevelt.” Caption: Democracy—That there’s a ray of sunshine.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-11-24
“Corbin How about Watterson? TR / Alaska boundary report on / Army moral report”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1902-03-25
The Democratic Donkey, as a woman, sits in a pew in a church with William Jennings Bryan preaching “Jeffersonian Simplicity” from a pulpit. On Bryan’s left are Alton B. Parker, Henry Watterson, and William Randolph Hearst, and among those on his right are New York City Mayor George B. McClellan Jr., former Representative Tom Watson of Georgia, Representative John Sharp Williams of Mississippi, and Senator “Pitchfork Ben” Tillman. All are preaching except Hearst, who righteously looks up to the heavens. In the background, the sun illuminates a stained glass window labeled “Our Thomas” and showing Thomas Jefferson. In a far corner of the church, Grover Cleveland is asleep. Caption: The Democratic Donkey (drowsily) — He-e-e Haw! What a lot of ways to be saved!
If “politics makes strange bedfellows,” the calendar can make them even stranger. Puck Magazine, generally and justly considered a Democratic journal for most of its life, placed itself in agreement with many of the policies of the new president, Theodore Roosevelt, after the assassination of President William McKinley. That is, until the presidential election year of 1904.
Whether the magazine and its principle owner Joseph Keppler, Junior felt obliged to revert to its Democrat roots; or were pressed by advertisers and its base; or — as sometimes happened, reportedly — the national Democratic party made capital infusions to buy the favor of the influential cartoon weekly, Puck lived somewhere between neutral and Democratic in 1904. It was, for instance, one of the initial backers of “safe and sane” Judge Alton B. Parker, the party’s eventual presidential nominee.
An elderly woman labeled “Democracy” stands next to a trunk labeled “Old Issues” and with a tag that states “To the White House.” Standing at the curb are several cab drivers labeled “Parker, Olney, Johnson, Shepard, Gorman, [and] Watterson” hoping to pick up a fare, and two other drivers labeled “Cleveland” and “Bryan” sitting on their carriages. Cleveland does not appear interested, though Bryan, on his cab labeled “16 to 1,” holding up his hat, calls out above the others.
Political cartoons, when well designed, not only present issues and events clearly, but also convey subtexts, background information, and nuances that speak to readers of their time, and to subsequent students of history.
Puck‘s cartoons frequently checked all those boxes. This double-spread by Pughe can be read as a portrayal of the fact that several Democrats vied for the attention of the national party, and jockeyed for the presidential nomination in 1904. Just so.
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.”
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.
President Roosevelt would like to replace Henry Watterson with L. Clark Davis on the Board of Visitors to the Military Academy.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1902-04-28
Ida B. Hiltz informs Theodore Roosevelt that he was elected as an Honorary Vice President of the American Association for the Conservation of Vision by its board of managers, alongside several other notable figures. Hiltz urges him to lend his name to the organization, which works toward the prevention of blindness.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-05-25
Ida M. Tarbell appreciates Theodore Roosevelt’s opinion on the sketch of James Gordon Bennett. However, she still defends his inclusion in the “Interesting People” exhibit and Henry Watterson’s writing.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-05-02
Asa M. Steele reports that Wall Street forces hostile to President Roosevelt are planning to precipitate a panic. He urges Roosevelt to consider running for president, because the current Republican contenders do not have his popularity or support from the people.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-04-14
Francis B. Loomis writes to President Roosevelt about the upcoming return of Secretary of State Root from his Pan-American visit. Loomis calls it an “important international event” that is receiving much press coverage. He hopes Root’s return is met with equal fanfare. Loomis envisions a homecoming event that is national and bipartisan, and suggests names for speakers and organizations to involve.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-09-20
In a chapter titled “A Most Just and Proper Revolution,” taken from the second volume of his biography of Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Rex, Edmund Morris details the machinations in Washington, D.C. and Panama that resulted in the revolution against Colombian rule on the Isthmus and the establishment of the independent nation of Panama. Morris describes the careful actions and words of administration figures like Roosevelt and Secretary of State John Hay, and he charts the movement of ships of the United States Navy sent in support of the insurrection. Morris adds to his Panama narrative interludes about the November 1903 elections in the United States, Roosevelt’s visit to Sagamore Hill, and his compilation of a reading list.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
2001
Aloysius A. Norton contends that Theodore Roosevelt “was able to think as a man and as a woman” because he had a strong sense of intuition that he often used to make decisions. Norton argues that the intuitive sense is most often identified with women and with the right side of the brain, but Norton says that Roosevelt made use of both sides of his brain, and he cites writers and thinkers who have studied the topic as well as contemporaries of Roosevelt such as William Allen White.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
1991
John H. Vivian examines the controversy that swirled around President Theodore Roosevelt’s executive order of August 1906 mandating a simplified form of spelling in certain government documents. He looks at the reaction of newspapers from around the country, and says that their initial reactions were overdone but were later tempered. He also examines the reaction from some agencies of the federal government, and notes opposition to the plan in Congress that centered less on concerns about spelling and more on Roosevelt’s use of executive power.
This article is also noteworthy as it is the first article in the Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal to have endnotes.
The Lincoln Farm Association invites Theodore Roosevelt to attend the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial Hall. Includes a card about special trains, an invitation from Governor Augustus Everett Willson, and a list of officers and trustees of the Lincoln Farm Association.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-11-09