Description

This print is a facsimile of an original Currier & Ives 1860 political cartoon featuring the presidential candidates for the four political parties. This cartoon depicts several political figures including Abraham Lincoln (Republican Party candidate) trying to cross the Salt River in Kentucky. Lincoln walks across his 'rail' which rests on a large boulder labeled "Abolition Rock" and is weighted at the other end by a man (Horace Greely) labeled "Tribune," who is falling off into the water. Stephen Douglas (northern Democratic Party) is falling off a rope labeled "Non Intervention" because of his weighted balance stick labeled "Squatter Sovereignty." Another man (Joseph Lane) carries a man (John Breckinridge, southern Democratic Party candidate) on his back while they cross a rope labeled "Slavery Extension." Two men (John Bell and Edward Everett, Constitutional Union Party candidate) stand behind on a bridge labeled "Constitutional Bridge." The left bank is the South, the right is the North. The print is titled in the bottom margin, "Political "Blondins" Crossing Salt River." For more information on this cartoon, see "Lincoln Lore" number 1423, September 1956, pages 1-2. Part of the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection, courtesy of the Indiana State Museum.