The Wasp — May 29, 1880 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# "The Eleventh Commandment" - The Illustrated Wasp This page satirizes San Francisco's bakers and their Sunday labor practices. The headline "THOU SHALT NOT EAT!" ironically invokes religious authority to criticize a city ordinance restricting Sunday baking. The text argues that while some citizens fear anarchy from enforcing rest days, the ordinance itself represents governmental overreach. The satire suggests bakery owners and legislators manipulate religious principle to justify commercial interests—that allowing bakers to work Sundays serves profit, not piety. The engraving shows a child with baking implements, likely emphasizing the human cost of unregulated labor: families dependent on continuous bakery work, including child labor. The satire questions whether community welfare or business interests truly drive the debate.