Keep off! Monroe doctrine - Drawing. Public domain image.

Uncle Sam, having spotted a man wearing a wide-brimmed hat fishing in a prohibited area of the Mexican coast, confronts him. He lifts the hat off the head of a Japanese soldier who is fishing with a rifle and bayonet in Magdalena Bay. A can of bullets labelled bait are next to the fisherman. Uncle Sam orders the soldier to go.

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Signed, lower left: TE Powers.

Title from sign in image.

Bequest and gift; Caroline and Erwin Swann; 1974; (DLC/PP-1974:232.1158)

Powers' editorial cartoon suggests the threat of Japanese aggression, relating to an April 1912 incident in which a Japanese fishing company attempted to purchase a large piece of land from Mexico on Magdalena Bay. Officials suspected the Japanese government of installing the fishing company there as a front in order to use the land for military purposes. When questioned by suspicious Americans, Japanese officials promised that the land would not be used for military purposes. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge saw it as a direct threat to American security, citing California and the Panama Canal as the most endangered by possible Japanese aggression. According to The Dictionary of American History, Lodge, later in August of that year, sponsored a resolution to be added to the Monroe Doctrine declaring, that "any harbor or other place in the American continents 'is so located that its occupation' for naval or military purposes might threaten the communications or the safety for the United States."

Published in: The image of America in caricature & cartoon / Amon Carter Museum of Western Art. Fort Worth : The Museum, 1975, p. 106.

Exhibited: Amon Carter Museum of Western Art, "The Image of America in Caricature & Cartoon," 1976.

monroe doctrine uncle sam symbolic character fishing international relations territorial waters magdalena bay mexico drawings american editorial cartoons periodical illustrations monroe doctrine japanese soldiers images of uncle sam prohibition amendment prohibition in 1920 s japan cartoon drawings swann collection of caricature and cartoon thomas e powers photo drawing politicians senator masonic masonry masonic lodge cartoon united states history political cartoons public domain cartoon images library of congress

01/01/1912

Library of Congress

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