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Liberal Republican Movement |
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“A ‘Liberal’ Surrender: Any Thing To Beat Grant.” |
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Cartoonist: Thomas Nast |
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Source: Harper's Weekly |
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Date:
May 11, 1872, p. 364
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Click to see a large version of this cartoon |
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Complete HarpWeek Explanation:
This prescient cartoon appeared on newsstands the
opening day (May 1) of the Liberal Republican Convention and depicts the
Democratic takeover of the Liberal Republican cause. Viewed from behind the
battlements outside of the nation's capital, Horace Greeley and Carl Schurz,
diametric opposites, stand together upon the barricade. The Tribune editor plays
the "charge" on his (inverted) trumpet and the senator waves the white
flag of "Truce/We Surrender/Anything To Beat Grant" to summon in from
the woods (right) the Ku Klux Klan, Copperheads, Slavery, the Confederate States
of America, and the Tammany Ring, all representing the Democratic party. Later,
in early July, the Democratic National Convention accepted the Liberal
Republican nominees and platform as its own.
Closer to the line (clockwise), Nathan Bedford Forrest, former Confederate
cavalry leader and Klan founder, Horatio Seymour and Frank Blair, the 1868
Democratic presidential and vice-presidential nominees, and Jefferson Davis,
former Confederate president, attempt to scale the barrier. Inside the
battlements, former president Andrew Johnson creeps out from under the tent
(extreme right). The tent at lower left has figures of (l-r) Trumbull, Tipton,
and Schurz caricatured on its panels.
The characterization of the Liberal Republicans as traitors is further
emphasized in the action of the trio of Liberal Republican senators(l-r), Thomas
Tipton, Reuben Fenton, and Lyman Trumbull, who train their "Cincinnati
Convention" cannon on the forces of President Ulysses S. Grant (calmly
smoking a cigar under the American flag, far left). Grant's cannon of the
regular Republican "Philadelphia Convention" (held June 5-6) is ready
to fire and his troops are prepared to charge. |
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