Judge — August 26, 1899 — page 1: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This cartoon satirizes President **McKinley** through a visual pun on Edwin Markham's famous 1899 poem "The Man with the Hoe," which depicted agricultural labor as exploitative and dehumanizing. The caricature shows McKinley as a grotesque figure tending a twisted, barren tree growing from a pedestal labeled "ARMY AND NAVY." The "fruit" emerging are spheres (likely representing territories or colonial possessions). A colonial building and palm trees suggest overseas expansion. The joke: McKinley, like Markham's laborer, is cultivating something, but instead of crops, he's harvesting imperial fruits from American military might. The satire critiques McKinley's expansionist foreign policy and the Spanish-American War aftermath, suggesting his administration was reaping problematic colonial consequences.