Experiments on the tight rope

A figurative portrayal of Whig candidate Winfield Scott's failure in the 1852 presidential contest, attributed by the artist to his alliance with abolitionist interests. Scott is hoisted aloft via a pulley system by various influential supporters, including (left to right): an unidentified man, New York "Times" editor Henry J. Raymond, black abolitionist Frederick Douglass, Boston editor and abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, Pennsylvania representative David Wilmot, and New York senator William Seward. They try to haul him up to the "President's Chair," which sits on a gallows-like structure, but the rope snaps owing to the "Free Soil" and "Abolition" weights chained to Scott's waist. Scott's supporters fall in unison to the left. Raymond: "You might have known them cussed weights would break the rope!" Seward:"Thus the noble Cesar fell, and you and I & all of us fell down and bloody Locofocoism flourished over us!" Scott (falling): "It may be the effect of my imagination, but it certainly feels as if something has given way!" At left, New York "Tribune" editor Horace Greeley rides a swaybacked horse carrying a "Tariff" bundle. He shouts to Scott, "Hold on General where you are just one minute till I come to help you!" Another man runs after Greeley crying, "Whoa! whoa! I say Greely don't ride that poor old nag to death!" Entering from the right-hand corner are a black man and his wife. The wife points at Scott and says, "Law! Mr. Cesar it seems to me dat de Gemman is gevine de wrong way."Pubd. by John Childs, 84 Nassau St. N. York.Signed with monogram: EWC (Edward Williams Clay).Title appears as it is written on the item.Davison, no. 205.Weitenkampf, p. 108-109.Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1852-31