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"Peevish School-Boys, Worthless of Such Honor."


Title "Peevish School-Boys, Worthless of Such Honor."
Artist/Maker Unidentified
after Thomas Nast
Harper's Weekly
Date 1874-06-06
Medium Wood engraving, black and white
Dimensions h. 9.5 x w. 13.5 in. (h. 24.13 x w. 34.29 cm)
Credit Line U.S. Senate Collection
Accession Number 38.00114.001


  • Object Description
  • A passionate Republican partisan, cartoonist Thomas Nast never hesitated to assail members of his own party who strayed from the Republican platform. The Panic of 1873 had led Congress to adopt an inflationary measure that increased the amount of greenbacks–paper money–in circulation. Nast’s hero, President Ulysses S. Grant, vetoed the bill in April 1874. Nast, who shared the president’s hard-money views, drew critical cartoons of Republicans who opposed Grant on the measure. Newspapers aligned with these senators then attacked Harper’s Weekly for becoming "a pictorial blackguard." Nast confronted Republican senators by inserting himself in this cartoon that appeared in Harper’s Weekly on June 6, 1874. Giving the impression that he is bowing, Nast stoops to read their "peevish" attacks on him, with the observation: "Republican senators can repudiate their platform, the national debt, or whatever they wish, but nobody may say a word against them, as they are sacred."

political-cartoons-caricatures ***t/artandhistory/art/resources/graphic/thumbnail/38_00114.jpgt***