The Democratic convention starts today, in Chicago. CIDU doesn’t deal with current politics, but 1968 is a long time ago, so let’s revisit some of the cartoons done around the time of that raucous Chicago convention.
A poster, not a cartoon:
Conventional Wisdom
Comics I Don't Understand 
Humphrey would have made a very long face if he had still been alive when Jimmy Carter called him “Hubert Horatio Hornblower” at the convention in 1980.
Maybe I’m mistaken in trying to make sense of the Citizen classes implemented in that top R. Cobb cartoon. Even without taking A, B, C to correspond to the Alpha, Beta, erm Gamma etc of Brave New World, there anyhow seems to be an order imposed by the usual alphabetical one. And yet, it is the middle Betas who get space on benches. And the curfew hours, though a bit hard to read, seem most restrictive on the A’s and most generous to the B’s, with the C’s intermediate. (That’s reading the number column headings as PM then AM, and taking that to mean “evening time when you must be off the streets” and “morning time when you may re-emerge”.)
Brahmins? Bourgeoisie? They don’t seem too happy about it.
There’s a pretty good book called The Nix which has a couple chapters about the ways the police maintained disorder. (As Mayor Daley said)
The A class managerial types get to sleep late and go to bed early. Or maybe party in non-curfew areas.
B class office workers get up early and go to bed late. What non-curfew areas?
C class physical workers are early to bed and early to rise. What’s a party?
Those B citizens are on their lunch break. A citizens wouldn’t be caught dead slumming on a park bench. They have nice lounges for their lunches. C citizens also have their own lunch stands… no seats.
That’s one possibility.
I thought that one of the fundamental attributes of the Police State in 1984 was that the “rules” were capricious and arbitrary.
I would have liked to add a cartoon by Pat Oliphant to this collection, but because of his syndication history, the Oliphant archive at GoComics only goes back to 1980. However, I was very pleasantly surprised to discover that the Library of Congress offers a wonderful collection of Herblock cartoons, including this one from 1968:
Caption: “Friends, I Want to Remove Any Cause for Contention Between You Two Fine Fellow-Democrats”
Kilby, that’s a great cartoon–and at a distance of over 50 years, I didn’t need the initials on the guys, his art was so evocative!
@ Phil (7) – While reviewing a very large number of old Herblock cartoons, I was astonished (and somewhat depressed) to discover just how many of them (across a wide variety of issues) were still just as relevant to the current political situation, over five decades later.
I’m guessing this is the great America Trump wants to get back too. Looks like it’s already here.
(I feel guilty discussing politics here.)
Monday I thought I had checked and my destinations for errands were safely outside the convention restricted zone. But in the actuality, I was able to complete only one of three planned activities.
@ Stan (9) – I’ll take the blame for that one. I had intended that cartoon @8 as commentary on the general lack of bipartisan civility, and neglected the inevitability of your interpretation. I guess I should have gone with one of Herblock’s (many) NRA polemics:
@ Kilby (11) Wow! Thanks for these contributions. In all these decades, it seems nothing at all has changed. The proof is in the panels.
@ Stan – I would like to encourage you and anyone else who appreciates Herblock to check out his Library of Congress archive, which offers a selection of 10 to 20 cartoons taken from each of 14 consecutive years of Herblock’s career (from 1961 to 1974). Each page of the archive offers links to each of the other years, making it very easy to navigate.