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- Title
- Banks & bribery, v.s. balls & bumbs scene 1st Or the destruction of aristocracy monopoly and oppression
- Description
- Cartoon concerning President Jackson's destruction of the Bank of the United States, including his veto of the Bank's recharter and the removal of its federal deposits. Depicts Jackson, "Jack Downing," and others attacking the Bank with axes, "veto mortar," and cannon balls. Jackson and "Downing" hollar about "smashing down" "Monopoly & Oppression" as well as the absence of a "nest of varmants" when the house was originally built. Members of Bank investigative "committees" flee the building, while others are crushed under the bank, its "deposit pillar" destroyed. Spectators, including evil sprites, run a press, clamor for tossed money bags labelled with alleged bribery amounts, and scream "This is a fair business transaction." Also includes sheets of paper scattered on the ground inscribed with allusions to the Bank War, including"Deranged Currency" and "Petitions.", Manuscript note on verso: From his Aunt Isabella 1840., Previous owner, probably C.P. Lukens. See Congressional Elephant political cartoons - 1832 - 2 (5760.f.42)., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, editions.
- Date
- [1834?]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department political cartoons - 1834-4W [5760.F.58]
- Title
- Political quixotism. Shewing the consequences of sleeping in patent magic spectacles The diplomatic hercules, attacking the political hydra
- Description
- Anti-Jackson cartoon alleging that irrational motives influenced the President's decision to destroy the Bank of the United States. Depicts a terrified Jackson, in his bedroom, fighting the hydra, "U.S. Bank," during a nightmare. References to the corruption of the Bank are inscribed on the creature's many heads, including "deposits," "pension," and "bribery." Jackson, sword in hand, screams "Stamp the horrid Monster!!! Crush it!!! Nick Biddle!!! Hell & the Devil!!! Bribery & Corruption!!! Assasination [sic]!! Fire!! Murder. Murder!! Where are you Major?" Jackson is being restrained by "Major" Jack Downing, who pulls on his suspenders and implores him to return to bed, "Cum along to Bed agin, Jineral, I tell you Biddle aint here, nor the devil nother as I no on." In the right background is a bed and a chair with a candle on it., Zek Downing was a pseudonym used by various artists on several cartoons, predominately published by Ezra Bisbee, which satirized the Bank War., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited.
- Date
- [1833]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department political cartoons - 1833-12 [5760.F.76]
- Title
- The smokers
- Description
- Cartoon concerning smoking as a vice depicting a crowd scene where everyone smokes, including women and children. In the foreground, a white man sits on a wooden chair holding a pipe in hand, refers to his "illustrious predecessor," Andrew Jackson. Two white boys light their cigars together. A finely dressed white woman carrying a parasol is horrified and says, "Oh! The monsters, I'm half blinded and suffocated" as she holds her nose. An elegantly dressed African American woman holds her hand to her nose and exclaims, "What a nasty practice, it's enough to make a dog sick." In the right, a white man street peddler carries a tray of plaster busts, including a pipe smoking Jackson. "Jack Downing," cigar in hand, states he picked up the habit in France and that his lighter was made from Jackson's spectacles but thinks a loco-foco (a faction of the Democrats who were named after a type of match) would go quicker. An African American chimney sweep and an African American shoe shiner shake hands with cigars in their mouths. They are portrayed in racist caricature and speak in the vernacular about smoking. "I say Josh, wot you smoke dem long nines for, why don't you smoke Half Spanish like a gen'leman." "Cause I've called in my Shin Plasters, and suspended Specie payments!!", Title from item., Date from copyright statement: Entered according to act of Congress, in the Year 1837, by H.R. Robinson, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the U.S. of the Southern Dist. of New York., Text printed on recto: Tobacco is a stinking weed, It was the Devil sow'd the seed, It drains the purse & fouls the clothes, And makes a chimney of the nose., RVCDC, Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Clay, born in Philadelphia, was a prominent caricaturist, engraver, and lithographer.
- Creator
- Clay, Edward Williams, 1799-1857, artist
- Date
- 1837
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Political Cartoons - 1837-25W [5656.F.3]
- Title
- Old Nick's new patent plan to make Nova Scotia tories, federals coodies, Hartford conventioners, nullifiers, national republican bankites &c
- Description
- Cartoon issued during the Bank War attacking Nicholas Biddle, president of the Bank of the United States, and his allegedly bribed New York newspaper editors for propagating an artificial financial crisis to sway public opinion in favor of the Bank. Depicts editors James W. Webb, Mordecai Manuel Noah, and probably Charles King using large screw presses to crush masses of working men ("workies"), including sailors, laborers, and butchers. Noah, fearing the strength of the "workies," loses control of his press from the shifting weight of his men; King twists his press and talks of the "division of the spoils"; and Webb urges a "good screwing" to gain the workers's suport and Biddle's fees. From below, the "workies" criticize the Bank as an institution of the aristocracy; allude favorably to Jackson and his veto of the Bank's recharter; scream their refusal to bow to a "golden calf"; and exclaim that they vote for liberty, not their "merchants breeches pockets." To the far right, Biddle hollers support to his "cousins"; "Jack Downing" questions the success of the presses; and a man with a monocle declares that the "workies" will not vote in the next election if they fail., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited.
- Date
- [1834]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department political cartoons - 1834-5 [5760.F.59]
- Title
- The people putting responsibility to the test or the downfall of the kitchen cabinet and collar presses
- Description
- Cartoon predicting the dire consequences to follow President Jackson's withdrawal of federal funds from the Bank of the United States. Depicts a riot in which Supreme Court Justice John Marshall warns that "the day of retribution is at hand" as anti-bank fiscal advisors Reuben Whitney and Thomas Ellicott use a rope to pull down a statue of Justice, depicted as a white woman holding scales and stepping on a snake, from a pedestal labeled "Constitution." An angry mob of white men farmers, laborers, and tradesmen carry instruments including axes, pitchforks, and shovels and papers labeled, “Broken Bank.” They fight and demand the recharter of the bank, shouting "Send back the deposites! Recharter the Bank!" and "Come back old responsibility." In the right, Jackson escapes on the back of "Jack Downing" cursing Postmaster General Kendall, "By the Eternal Major Downing; I find Ive been a mere tool to that Damn'd Amos [Kendall] and his set, the sooner I cut stick the better." In the left background, under "Senate Chamber," Henry Clay gloats to Daniel Webster and John Calhoun, "Behold Senators the fulfilment of my predictions." In the left foreground, two African American men, portrayed in racist caricature and speaking in the vernacular, predict freedom and the ascension to the throne of abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, "Hurrah! for Massa Garison, den he shall be King!" A Jewish banker, portrayed in caricature, undercuts a sailor offering him a ten dollar bank note, "Mine Got that ish one of the Pet Bankhs I'll give you one Dollar for the Ten." In the right foreground, newspapers supportive of Jackson, "collar presses," symbolized as dogs with human heads labeled "Evening Post, N. York Standard, Journal of Commerce, Albany Argus," run away chained together., Title from item., Date from copyright statement: Entered according to Act of Congress in the Clerk's Office for the Southern District of New York by T.W. Whitley in the year 1834, and for sale at 104 Broadway., RVCDC, Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Whitley was a mid-19th-century New York landscape and figure painter who also wrote about art and drama for the New York Herald.
- Creator
- Whitley, T. W. (Thomas W.), artist
- Date
- 1834
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Political Cartoons - 1834-7 [1884.F.3]