Judge, 1889-11-09 · page 18 of 18
Judge — November 9, 1889 — page 18: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This two-panel cartoon satirizes voting behavior and party mechanics in what appears to be the late 19th or early 20th century. The top panel shows a rural farmer (stereotypically Republican) deciding not to vote due to muddy roads and distance to town—depicting Republicans as apathetic about voting. The bottom panel contrasts this with a "City Heeler" (a Democratic political operative) aggressively mobilizing voters, even encouraging fraud ("vote twice if yez can"), shown monitoring the process. The cartoon's point: Republicans lost elections because their rural base was complacent about voting, while Democrats' urban political machines actively worked to maximize votes through aggressive—and implied corrupt—tactics. It reflects contemporary concerns about urban machine politics versus rural indifference.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
comicbooks.com W yAmMANY THE USUAL CAUSE FOR REPUBLICAN DEFEAT. Farmer (a/ways a Republican) “It's three miles t' town an’ the roads is muddy an’ I'm Ciry HEELER (a/ways a Democrat) “Let every mother’s son of yez vote an’ vote twice tired. Reck'n I'll not vote this year.” if yez can—me eye is on yez!"