Judge, 1914-05-16 · page 9 of 24
Judge — May 16, 1914 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This article satirizes American politics by comparing it to baseball. The author argues politics is the "real" national sport because it runs year-round (primaries, conventions, campaigns, elections, legislative sessions, graft investigations) versus baseball's nine-month season. The cartoon illustrates the article's central joke: a man at a restaurant insists on paying the check himself to maintain dignity, despite clearly needing his mother's financial help. This visual metaphor represents political corruption—politicians claiming honorable motives while accepting bribes and graft. The article mocks how Americans obsessively gamble on politics, even wheelbarrowing losers down Main Street. It notes that unlike baseball (a spectator sport), "politics we are all players"—everyone participates, including women and children through voting. The satirical tone criticizes both widespread political corruption and Americans' enthusiasm for it, suggesting the "game" of politics is equally entertaining but far more consequential than sports.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
FOR THE SAKE OF HIS DIGNITY “Slip me the money, mother, and let me pay the check” ‘ASEBALL has usually | been called the nation- al sport, but all think- ing people are begin- ning to see the mis- take. Politics is really entitled to the distine- tion. Baseball can be played only nine months in the year, but politics goes on forever. In June and July we have our pri- maries. In August there are the conven- tions. In September and October the earth is moved out of its orbit, the at- mosphere burned, and the heavens bom- barded with the political campaign. In November come the elections and the set- tlement of bets. In December Congress meets. In January the Legislature breaks out like a virulent disease, and runs through February and March. In April The National Sport By FRANK A. WAUGH the graft investigations begin, opening up one of the largest fields of politics yet discovered; and before they are quieted in May, the stump speakers are already charging about the country in their auto- mobiles, fixing things for the next pri- maries, All these twelve months the political newspapers have been shouting them- selves black in the face, with two pages a day of political ‘* "’ and one (edito- rial) column of pol 1 guff, Another reason why politics beats base- ball as a national sport is because it is a better betting proposition. Any man will bet five dollars on the home team, and vill bet a hundred on the But on a hot election Also on the some men world’s series. men will wager thousands. first Wednesday after the first Monday in November in each succeeding year will be seen men trundling each other down Main Street in wheelbarrows to show their sporting blood. Baseball enthusi- asm never carried a man so far as that. A highly valid objection often brought against baseball is that only a very, very few persons take any part in the sport. The vast majority merely look on and curse the umpire. But in the game of politics we are all players. Even the women. For outside of Illinois, Kansas, California and the other suffering States, where the ladies are as deep in the mud as the men in the mire, they are by no means out of the game. They are in every play already. In our town even the children train for the game. On convention and election days the sport-imbued teachers arrange the ballot boxes and let every blessed freeborn child have a whack. This is also called the New Freedom. comicbooks.com