An Heir to the Throne, Or the Next Republican Candidate

Phineas Taylor Barnum|Louis Maurer|Currier & Ives|Abraham Lincoln|Horace Greeley

1860 · Lithograph · Drawings and Prints

This cruel political cartoon relies on racial stereotypes commonplace in the northern United States as well as the south at this date. Horace Greeley and Abraham Lincoln flank an undersized Black man who wears short pants and supports himself on a staff. The text makes it clear that he is being introduced as the Republican party's successor to Lincoln while faint lettering on the wall reads "Barnum's / What is it / Now / Exhibiting," comparing the man to strange creatures exhibited at P. T. Barnum's American Museum in New York.

Artist

Phineas Taylor Barnum|Louis Maurer|Currier & Ives|Abraham Lincoln|Horace Greeley

Date

1860

Medium

Lithograph

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

Gift of A. S. Colgate, 1952