Life, 1920-09-02 · page 17 of 52
Life — September 2, 1920 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This political cartoon satirizes opponents of the League of Nations (Wilson's post-WWI international organization, debated circa 1919-1920). The unnamed "Senator Sounder" presents increasingly contradictory objections: he claims the League threatens sovereignty while acknowledging it doesn't; professes ignorance about international banking yet blames it; says the League will reduce wars but opposes it anyway; and demands 100% Americanism while offering no alternative plan. The satire's point is clear: the Senator's arguments are hollow rhetoric masking isolationism and partisan obstruction. His gestures grow more animated and his logic more circular with each panel, visually emphasizing the incoherence. The cartoonist mocks senators who opposed the League with vague patriotic appeals rather than substantive critiques—a common criticism of League opponents in the historical debate.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
~-LIFE- Senator Sounder Shows Up the League “I wish to give to the press a simple, concise “In the first place, though the Le: statement, irrefutable in its logic, of why I oppose ently quite constitutional, I believe the League of Nations. my first duty is to uphold the Con great and glorious nation. Secondly, though I do not claim that the League “Thirdly, if I knew just what international bank- threatens our sovereignty, my course as an Ameri- ers were, or what they had to do with the case, I can is plainly to keep our sovereignty unimpaired could explain why, on their account, I could not and unsurrendered, possibly vote for the League, “ Fourthly, though the League will do much to end “But my chief objection to the League is th wars, protect small countries and reduce armaments, while no one has been able to devise a better p 5 is that reason to make me forget that I am one- what a vastly better plan I and my colleagues could hundred-per-cent, American? devise.” comicbooks.com