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HarpWeek Commentary:
This cartoon in the issue of November 3, 1866, appeared about two weeks
before Election Day. It shows Johnson as King with Secretary of State William H. Seward as
his grand vizier pointing to the line for the chopping block. At the left is Secretary of
the Navy Gideon Welles as Neptune; "290" on his chest is the original number for
the Alabama, the British-built warship that the Confederates under Raphael Semmes
used to sink Union merchant ships during the war. At the right, Miss Liberty sits in
chains. Seward is shown below because he made a speech in St. Louis after Johnson spoke in
which he referred to a king-minister relationship as an analogy for Johnson and himself.
The man with his head on the chopping block
is Thaddeus Stevens, Johnson’s principal adversary in the House. Behind Stevens are
abolitionist Wendell Phillips, publisher John W. Forney, Senator Charles Sumner
(Johnson’s principal adversary in the Senate), Congressman (and General) Benjamin
Butler, orator Anna Elizabeth Dickinson, publisher Horace Greeley, Congressman John Logan
and, at the very rear, Thomas Nast himself with a sketchbook under his arm.
The upside down duck on Johnson’s
medallion is significant. John Forney, whose Philadelphia and Washington newspapers
irritated Johnson, had called Forney a "Dead Duck." Nast used the "Order of
Dead Ducks" to lampoon Johnson on several occasions. |
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