"Of Course He Wants To Vote The Democratic Ticket": Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

The off-white discolored paper features an image in black ink. It depicts two men threatening an unarmed man with pistols. The man on the proper right side is wearing a dark jacket, a shirt, trousers, a hat with a bent brim, and boots. He is resting his proper left hand on the shoulder of the unarmed man. The man in the center has curly hair and is wearing a long sleeve shirt and patched trousers. His right arm is across his chest, and he is holding a piece of paper. His proper left arm is down by his side. Pistols are pointed at both sides of his head. The man on the proper left side is wearing a long sleeve shirt, dark trousers, a large hat, and boots. He carries a pistol on each hip, and his proper left hand is in his pocket. There are several men standing in the background.

The proper right foreground features two wooden ballot boxes, a liquor bottle, a glass, and a pistol. There is a man standing in the doorway in the background. There are several men and horses outside of the building. There is a typed paragraph in the bottom proper right corner. There is a caption below the image, typed in black ink. It reads ["OF COURSE HE WANTS TO VOTE THE DEMOCRATIC TICKET!"/ DEMOCRATIC "REFORMER." "You're as free as air, ain't you! Say you are, or I'll blow yer black head off!"]. There is sideways typed text along the proper left side of the paper. It reads [848], HARPER’S WEEKLY], and [October 21, 1876]. The illustration is signed, “A. B. FROST” in the bottom proper left corner of the image.

The paper is surrounded by a black mat. There are several columns of black text on the back of the paper. The paper is taped onto the back of the mat.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: October 21, 1876
• Illustrated by: Arthur Burdett Frost, American, 1851 - 1929
• Published by: Harper's Weekly, American, 1857 - 1916
• Subject of: Harvey Magee Watterson, American, 1811 - 1891
• Type: illustrations
• Type: newspapers
• Medium: ink on wove paper
• Dimensions: H x W (in mat): 14 × 18 in. (35.6 × 45.7 cm)
• Dimensions: H x W (paper): 10 5/8 × 15 3/4 in. (27 × 40 cm)
• Place depicted: Tennessee, United States, North and Central America
• Place printed: United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: American South
• Topic: Men
• Topic: Politics
• Topic: Race discrimination
• Topic: Reconstruction, U.S. History, 1865-1877
• Topic: Suffrage
• Topic: Violence
• Object number: 2012.160.64
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Stanley Turkel's Collection of Reconstruction Era Materials
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The displayed image also has an explicit CC0 designation. The underlying object's rights statement is: No Known Copyright Restrictions Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.