Life, 1914-01-22 · page 27 of 40
Life — January 22, 1914 — page 27: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The top cartoon depicts a cigar manufacturer haggling over a car's value, asking "How much will you take for your entire cabbage crop?"—a nonsensical juxtaposition satirizing absurd business dealings. The main article attacks Delaware's disproportionate political representation. The author argues that a state with a population roughly equal to Columbus, Ohio, yet maintains two senators, a congressman, a governor, and two legislative bodies—identical to vastly larger states like New York—represents governmental absurdity. The satire highlights the structural inequality of the Senate, where small states wield outsized power. The author proposes renaming Delaware the "Rhinestone State" (fake diamond) rather than "Diamond State," mocking its pretensions. The concluding section questions whether sensationalist newspaper coverage of crimes actually exists in reality or creates its own distorted world, critiquing press responsibility.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
President of Cigar Manufacturing Company: Why Is Delaware? ORE important than the question of the whipping post in Delaware is the question of Delaware itself How do we happen to he so minus a sense of proportion as to apply the designation, State, to that little neck of the woods? Shouldn't that designa- tion be kept for something more ma- jestic and worth while? Not entirely that Delaware is so small in area; Rhode Island is smaller, but Rhode Island, besides holding her head up and being careful of her ap- pearance, has the incomparable New port and the more or less divine Provi- dence, So also are there two states, Wyoming and Nevada, smaller in population than Delaware, but both of these are increasing rapidly and give evidence of at least trying to make something of themselves, while Dela- ware, venerable enough to know better and do better, is standing almost still and worrying nonesoever over her stagnation. Nearly half of Delaware's popula- tion is in Wilmington, her sole city, the balance of the state containing about as many people as Dayton, O. The whole state, therefore, can muster only a few more people than Columbus, O., and a few less than Portland, Ore. Reflect a moment upon the absurdity of having two senators, one congress- man, a governor, two legislative bodies, ete, for a place like Columbus, O., in HOW MUCH WILL YOU TAKE FOR YOUR ENTIRE CABBAGE CROP? THE ORIGINAL EUGENICS addition, of course, to the regular local administration! It is to laugh uproari- ously and without stint. Although Delaware has only one forty-fifth as many people as the State of New York, she sends just as many senators to Washington, with unlimited authority to clutter up the already overburdened Congressional Record and otherwise add to the complications of govern- ment. And yet the college professors still temerariously intimate that there is a “science of political economy”. Delaware has been called The Diamond State, as a polite tribute (or boast) to its multum-in-parvoness. We move to amend hy substituting the word “rhinestone” for the word “diamond” and striking out the word “state” entirely. E.0.J. Real or News Papers WWOVED it hetp to abate the missing- girl and poisoned-needle epi- demics if the pictures of the young ladies were kept out of the paper? Constantly the question presses—Is this a real world that we live in now or a one-cent newspaper world? comicbooks.com