Life, 1904-05-26 · page 15 of 22
Life — May 26, 1904 — page 15: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains multiple satirical pieces from early 20th-century Life magazine: **"Liberties" section**: Critiques American military spending, arguing it costs a republic more to maintain liberties than it costs European monarchies to suppress them—a pointed jab at perceived wasteful defense expenditures. **"Signal" section**: Mocks the 1898 Philippines Purchase Exposition in Manila as absurdly lavish. The "hundred billions of dollars" expenditure (clearly hyperbolic satire) and million-acre scale are presented as ridiculous excess, reflecting contemporary debate over American imperialism following the Spanish-American War. **Bottom cartoons**: Two brief jokes—one about a church-attending man who admits he attends merely to rest ("thinks o' nothin'"), and another about a father unable to delay his daughter's wedding because creditors won't wait. Both mock financial desperation and hypocrisy. The overall tone satirizes American spending priorities: military budgets, imperial exhibitions, and personal debt—suggesting misplaced values in the young nation.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Sih Liberties. 'IGURES seem to say that we are paying out more for soldiers than several of the great military powers of Eu- rope are paying out. Assuredly there is something wrong when it costs kings less to trample on liberties than it costs a republic to extend these. The present bull tend- ency in the price of lib- erty may be due merely to the shorts scrambling for cover, and again it may— But sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Signal. HE year 1998 was made signal by the Philippines Purchase Expo- sition at Manila. The exposition was the largest ever held, up to that time, and represented an expenditure of about a hundred billions of dol- lars. The buildings covered one mil- lion acres, It took a per- son more than three weeks, trav- eling through the aisles in an automo- bile at the rate of a mile a minute, to see everything in the exposi- tion. The deficit was less than sixty billions. ECTOR: I'm glad to see you are such a constant attendant at church, Patrick. Patrick: Oh, I enj'ys it, sorr. = , I sits me down and lays me legs t We up and thinks o nothin’ A CONVERSION -: . ‘ $ * CAN'T you wait a year before SAY, MA, I BELIEVE fr."" bf id “ peuieve wat?" marrying my daughter? “THAT 11's MORE BLESSED TO GIVE THAN RECEIVE." “Tcan, but my creditors can | comicbooks.com