The American Family: Under a Low Tariff

The American Family: Under a Low Tariff
The American Family: Under a Low Tariff

The American Family: Under a Low Tariff

Date1911
Artist (American illustrator and cartoonist, 1866–1933)
Illustration CitationPuck, May 17, 1911
MediumCommercial relief process with hand-coloring
Dimensionscomposition: 11 1/16 × 8 5/16 in. (28.1 × 21.1 cm)
sheet: 13 3/16 × 21 1/8 in. (33.5 × 53.7 cm)
Credit LineGift of Helen Farr Sloan, 1978
Object number1978-309
On View
Not on view
ClassificationsPRINT
Label TextFor this Puck centerfold, Louis Glackens presents a happy, well-fed family and their servant, enjoying the benefits of a low-tariff American trade policy. They can evidently afford seven children, a servant, and a cat. The subject was in the news, as President William Howard Taft favored revising the tariff downward, while congressional factions disagreed.

In the other half of the centerfold, Gordon Grant presents a couple and their one child, as the parents struggle to pay their bills in the economic downturn resulting from a high tariff. The father's expression and hand gesture convey the emotional duress of their plight.




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