Currier & Ives

Probably drawn by Louis Maurer

The National Game, Three “Outs” and One “Run”

Abraham Winning the Ball

The Library of Congress gives the following description of this complex cartoon:

A pro-Lincoln satire, deposited for copyright weeks before the 1860 presidential election. The contest is portrayed as a baseball game in which Lincoln has defeated (left to right) John Bell, Stephen A. Douglas, and John C. Breckinridge.

Lincoln (right) stands with his foot on “Home Base,” advising the others, “Gentlemen, if any of you should ever take a hand in another match at this game, remember that you must have a ‘good bat’ and strike a ‘fair ball’ to make a ‘clean score” & a ‘home run.’” His “good bat” is actually a wooden rail labeled “Equal Rights and Free Territory.” Lincoln wears a belt inscribed “Wide Awake Club.”

A skunk stands near the other candidates, signifying that they have been “skunk'd.”

Breckinridge (center), a Southern Democrat, holds his nose, saying, “I guess I'd better leave for Kentucky, for I smell something strong around here, and begin to think, that we are completely ‘skunk'd.’” His bat is labeled “Slavery Extension” and his belt “Disunion Club.”

At far left John Bell of the Constitutional Union party observes, “It appears to me very singular that we three should strike ‘foul’ and be ‘put out’ while old Abe made such a ‘good lick.’ Bell's belt says “Union Club,” and his bat “Fusion.”

Regular Democratic nominee Douglas replies, “That's because he had that confounded rail, to strike with, I thought our fusion would be a ‘short stop’ to his career.” He grasps a bat labeled “Non Intervention.”

The National Game. Three “Outs” and One “Run”, by Currier & Ives, Probably drawn by Louis Maurer, Inscribed bottom center: “Sept. 15, 1860.”