The Wasp — 1896 — page 791: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

The main cartoon depicts Lady Liberty atop a barrel labeled "STEAM BEER POLITICS," suggesting that San Francisco's political establishment is built on—or corrupted by—the beer industry's influence. The text below criticizes recent nominating conventions as "many ways things to be exclaimed about," implying backroom deals and questionable practices. It contrasts "free trade and free speech" rhetoric with actual exclusions of certain groups, arguing that true liberty requires residents of "another country" rather than America under current conditions. The satire attacks San Francisco politics as fundamentally compromised by commercial interests, particularly the beer industry, while claiming to represent democratic principles it actually betrays.