The dead lion represented the recently deceased Edw ... control over the vanquished South under Reconstruction. In the cartoon, Nast (1840-1902) was voicing his view that the Copperhead press ...

A play on the proverb “a live ass is better than a dead lion”, Nast’s cartoon carries a different message. In it the donkey—ears back, hind legs poised to deliver a vicious blow⁠—is ...

In his cartoon, the donkey, standing in for the Copperhead press, is kicking a dead lion, representing President Lincoln’s recently deceased press secretary (E.M. Stanton). With this simple but ...

Beneath was this line: "A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion." To say that that pioneer cartoon raised a merry war is to put it but gently, as Pat broke the news to the sudden widow O'Hara when her ...

On this day in 1870, leading political cartoonist Thomas Nast’s drawing “A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion” appeared in Harper’s Weekly. The cartoon solidified the donkey as the symbol of ...