After Hayes was sworn in as the 19th President of the United States, Nast made a few more political cartoons expressing his thoughts on the results. Click through the slideshow below to learn about three of the political cartoons published after the election results were decided. 

A battered Republican Elephant concluded Nast’s coverage of the bitter presidential election of 1876 between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel Tilden. The election was the closest in American history at the time. Hayes won the election by one electoral vote, despite the fact that Tilden won a popular majority of over a quarter million. Nast depicts the Republican Elephant nursing its wounds after the Party’s close victory.

Thomas Nast drawing published in Harper's Weekly on March 24, 1877

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Macculloch Hall Historical Museum

Another Such Victory, and I am Undone

This Nast political cartoon shows Uncle Sam on his way to bed holding a candlestick to light his way. The illustration caption reads “U.S.: The children are amused with their new Toys, and I will turn in.” Hayes was finally elected President, and a new Congress was elected. The Congress was now in recess and Uncle Sam could now rest. Until next time.

Only four times in history has a Presidential candidate lost the popular vote, but but won electoral vote to become President. Besides 1876, those times are: 

1888- Benjamin Harris beat Grover Cleveland

*In 1824 neither candidate won a majority of the electoral votes so the House of Representatives selected the President, John Quincy Adams.

Thomas Nast drawing published in Harper's Weekly on April 7, 1877

New donation from the Estate of John Adler

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Our Uncle Sam Going to Take a Rest

The post-Civil War Reconstruction period intended to heal the nation politically and economically was generally accepted as a failure by 1877. The presence of federal troops in the South more than a decade after the Civil War offended the citizenry. Military administration fostered corrupt local politics throughout the former Confederacy. Most significantly, the result of the heavy-handedness of Northern liberal Reconstruction, as 

 reported in this issue on May 5, 1877 for which Nast illustrated this cover, was that “instead of protecting the negro, the policy inflamed against him still more bitterly the feeling of the white and drew the color line more and more deeply.” The newly elected President Rutherford B. Hayes was left little choice but to abandon Reconstruction.

Nast championed the promise of civil rights for former enslaved people and was unsure if the new President’s policies would support this idea. In this front-page cartoon, Nast was able to admit his quick temper on the subject and use Uncle Sam to poke fun at his own indignation:

Uncle Sam says: Our artist must keep cool, and sit down, and see how it works.

Nast depicts Uncle Sam telling him to practice patience and give the President’s policies a chance.

How does seeing political cartoons from Thomas Nast's perspective and opinion affect the information you learn about this topic?

Thomas Nast drawing published on the front page of Harper's Weekly on May 5, 1877

Donated by Nancy C. and Thomas A. Cantwell

Standards for Victory

College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework

National Core Arts Standards