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"Those who never read the editorials were delighted with the caricature ... those who read and those who did not, became interested, then angry, and finally determined." 1 So Life cofounder, John A. Mitchell, writing in 1889, characterized the influence of the well-drawn political cartoon. He complements Worth Robert Miller's argument that the political cartoons that supported the Peoples' Party were "at least part of the reason the Populist Revolt brought forth the greatest political participation of poor people in American political history" (185). What mugwump humor magazine Puck did for its Gilded Age readers and critics, Populist newspapers did as well: they frequently paired print commentary--often taken from other news sources--with politically charged cartoons that educated and evangelized target constituencies, especially southern and western farmers, but also laborers and silver miners, socialists, and other reform-minded urbanites. Believing Republicans and Democrats had abandoned the rural and urban poor, Populist newspapers spread the word that eventually convinced those voters to cast their ballots in near record numbers by 1896. Cartoons, mostly outsourced to freelance artists, tugged at heartstrings and exacerbated the ire of those who found grounds for hope in the Populist insurgency and those who felt threatened by its egalitarian thrust.
It is always difficult, if not impossible, to assess the importance of a particular visual medium. Miller, however, quite reasonably contends that Populist newspapers, which operated on "shoestring" budgets, were willing and able to pay cartoonists because readers and subscribers demanded cartoons. Such an explanation may not tell the whole story of the cartoons' importance, but it does explain a good deal of it. Even more than the printed word, cartoons embraced and enlivened the ideological heart of the Peoples' Party. They attacked plutocrats and other alleged conspirators intent on destroying the Jeffersonian-inspired Populist vision of American life. A well-drawn picture, then as now, grabbed viewers' attention and often acted as a springboard to the accompanying printed word.
In analyzing these cartoons, Miller draws upon his...