120. [Political Cartoon]. Rare broadside etching on wove paper, image being (8.5 x 6 in.; 216 x 152 mm.) (overall 9.5 x 7 in.; 241 x 178 mm.), First Edition, Third State. Titled “Congressional Pugilists”. Pinhole at “gi”; minor flaws.

Rare vintage 18th Century Political Cartoon depicting two New England Congressmen, a Federalist with a cane and a Republican with fireplace tongs, battling on the floor of the House of Representatives.

Early American political cartoon depicting the famous fight on the floor of the House of Representatives on 15 February 1798 which was started when Federalist Representative from Connecticut, Roger Griswold, attacked Republican Representative from Vermont, Matthew Lyon with a cane; Lyon retaliated with fireplace tongs. The story instantly became legend and soon poems and other satires appeared celebrating the nonsense in Congress, one of which is etched in the lower margin of this print: “He in a trice struck Lyon thrice, Upon is head, enrag’d Sir, Who seiz’d the tongs to ease his wrongs, and Griswold thus engag’d, Sir.”

E. McSherry Fowble, in
Two Centuries of Prints in America, 1680-1880, notes that “to make this event among statesmen appear even more outrageous, the design of this version so distorted the features of other congressmen, who had stooped to cheering the combatants or, at least, to enjoying the fracas, that he had to rework the copperplate by adding the names of key figures in the margins” in the Second State. This is the Third State with “17” in the top margin. See Edgar P. Richardson, The Birth of Political Caricature, p.87; Martin P. Snyder, City of Independence, pp. 212-223; Frank Weitenkampf, Political Caricature in the United States in Separately Published Cartoons, p.12; William Murrell, A History of American Graphic Humor, I: 42-44. $1,000 - $1,500

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June 11, 2015 11:00 AM PDT
26662 Agoura Rd
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