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Title: Sunday laws hanging the cat on Monday for killing the mouse on Sunday
Description: Cartoon mocking Philadelphia's Sunday Laws depicting the moment before "Thomas" the cat will be hanged for his murder of a mouse on the Sabbath. In the center, shows the gallows surrounded by a line of white policemen, attired in uniforms and caps. In the left, three white hangmen, attired in suits, hold onto the rope and pull on the unlooped end of the noose. Two of the men smile sinisterly, while the third man wipes his tears with a handkerchief as he says, “Alas poor Tom!” To the right, an African American man, portrayed in racist caricature with exaggerated features, carries the "Blood Tub." Under the noose, a white man, possibly Philadelphia Mayor Alexander Henry, stands holding an execution order that reads, “Mayor Public Execution Tom” and the cat by the scruff of its neck. Before him stands a minister, resembling John Chambers, a champion of the Sunday Laws. He holds the dead mouse in this right hand and an open book in his left hand as he sentences the cat to death for murder. Behind the minister, an elderly white man, attired in a suit with a white bowtie, stands slightly hunched down holding an ear trumpet to his right ear. He comments, “I can’t hear a word the minister says on account of them cars,” a reference to the contested Sunday Law against the running of streetcars. A black dog runs in the left foreground., Title from item., Date from manuscript note written on recto: Aug. 1859., Place of publication inferred from content., Text printed on recto, below image: In the Dark Ages, long ago, One Horne was flogged on Monday; What for? That’s what I want you to know, He danced a horn-pipe Sunday! That was all! He but danced a horn-pipe Sunday, But he danced to the horsewhip Monday. By the roundheads, too, when Cromwell reigned, We read there was a hung on Monday, A cat who “the Sabbath day (?) profaned” By cat-ching a mouse on Sunday? Understand: She played with him first on Sunday, ‘Twas for that she was hung on Monday! And by America’s Puritan men, Mrs. Hotchkiss was punished on Monday; Cotton Mather forbade her, but once and again, She had kissed her babe on Sunday; A blow for a kiss. For so many kisses on Sunday, She got so many blows on Monday. So, too, in Brooklyn, the other day, Meyerbeer was tried on Monday; The complaint against him thus did say “He has sold lager beer on Sunday” And he had! But the jury said, on Monday! A good drink might be sold Sunday! And in the West’s “Queen city,” too, One Rudolph’s just ‘quitted on Monday; He would drive his ‘bus the whole week through And accommodate people on Sunday: And the Court, Gave the very Pruden-t decision on Monday, That “there’s more than ‘one thing needful’ on Sunday:” And so the “good time” is “coming” boys When a thing that is good on Monday—A drink, or a drive, or a joyful noise—Will be thought not bad on Sunday! Everywhere When wrong will be wrong on Monday, And right will be right on Sunday!, Accessioned 1893., 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.
Date: [Philadelphia]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Political Cartoons - 1859-Sun [5656.F.24a]

Title: Congressional Pugilists He in a trice struck Lyon thrice
Description: Depicts a fight on the floor of Congress Hall between Vermont Representative Matthew Lyon and Connecticut Representative Roger Griswold. In the right, Griswold kicks Lyon and holds a cane up to strike him. Lyon grasps Griswold's right arm and raises a pair of fireplace tongs to hit him. Speaker Jonathan Dayton and Clerk Jonathan W. Condy (both seated), Chaplain Ashbel Green (in profile on the left), and several others look on. In the background on the wall is a framed picture with two roosters whose caption reads "Royal sport." The fight was originally prompted by an insulting reference to Lyon on Griswold's part., Title from item., Date inferred from content., 19th century restrike., Weitenkampf lists three states of this print: in the first only the title appears above the image and the four lines of verse in the center below the image and "Congress Hall, in Philada. Feb. 15, 1798" etched in the lower right corner; in the second the title, and keyed references in the (plate) margins of the second appear above the image and "Congress Hall, in Philada. Feb. 15.1798" is etched in the lower right corner; the third is identical to the second state but has "17" etched in the upper right hand corner and "Congress Hall, in Philada. Feb. 15, 1798. "S.E. Cor. 6th & Chesnut St." in the lower right corner; the images remain the same in all three states., Below image in lower right corner: Congress Hall, in Philada., Feb. 15, 1798, S.E. Cor. 6th & Chestnut St., Four lines of verse in two columns below image in center: He in a trice struck Lyon thrice, upon his head, enrag'd sir, who seized the tongs to ease his wrongs, and Griswold thus engag'd, sir., Three of the spectators are identified by numbered references etched on left and top of plate, outside image., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited.
Date: [1798]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department political cartoons - 1798-3b (second state) [2569.Q.17]

Title: An Au-Gust Convention
Description: Cartoon satirizing the National Union Convention, which met in Philadelphia in August of 1866, in an attempt to support President Andrew Johnson and his Reconstruction policies and elect a new Congress. Muzzled dogs, each representing a state, walk down a path towards a dog house labeled, “Wigwam,” which was the name of the structure in Philadelphia that was quickly erected for the convention. Outside the house, two guard dogs, representing Johnson supporters Edgar Cowen and James Rood Doolittle, each hold cats in their mouths, representing the two notorious Peace Democrats, or Copperheads, Clement Vallandigham and Fernando Wood, who were barred from the convention. At the head of the parade, the Massachusetts and South Carolina dogs march together, representing General Darius Nash Couch and Governor James Lawrence Oliver, the representatives from those states, respectively. These two men entered the Convention arm-in-arm to demonstrate the possibility for national reconciliation. The South Carolina dog, however, also has its genitals muzzled, as it was the first state to secede from the Union at the beginning of the war. In the left is a small, muzzled dog with a brush and bucket, labeled “N.Y. Times,” tied to its tail that represents Henry Raymond, co-founder of the New York Times and pro-Johnson Republican Congressman. Raymond organized the convention and was removed from his position as Chairman of the Republican National Committee because of it. In the left background, shows the White House with a Confederate flag, with “My Policy,” flying and a dead dog lying on the ground representing Johnson. Radical and moderate Republicans in Congress believed that his treatment of the Southern states under his Reconstruction plan was too lenient., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited.
Date: [1866]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | PRINT political cartoons - 1866-11 [5760.F.113]

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