Setting the Signals

Grant Hamilton's cover depicts Uncle Sam atop the Capitol dome, hoisting two semaphore-style signal flags: a white pennant bearing "Big Crops / Prosperity" (red square) and a second reading "Business / Confidence" (yellow square). Below, crowds labeled Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, New York, St. Louis, and other cities cheer from the surrounding landscape. The caption reads simply Setting the Signals. Published the day after Roosevelt's landslide victory over Alton Parker, the cartoon is straightforwardly triumphalist: the Republican administration has delivered agricultural abundance and commercial confidence, and the nation—coast to coast—is signaling back its approval. No ethnic caricature appears here; Hamilton keeps the imagery generic and celebratory, the flags functioning as both nautical metaphor and electoral scoreboard.