8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan 3. Each week, american artifacts taking viewers into archives, museums and historic sights around the country. The library of congress the largest collection of political cartoons of herbert block known as herblock. Herblocks career spanned 20 years. 72 yores. Years. The librarys sarah duke talked to us about his influence and legacy and showed us many of his exhibits in the herblock gallery. Herb block was a midwestern born cartoonist. He began his career in 1929, six months before the Great Depression. He was a moderate conservative in his start. And he was radicalized, not leftleft, put pushed him further towards the center but a Great Depression and then the injustice of world war ii. In 1933, he joined the Scripps Howard company, the Newspaper Enterprise Association which was situated in cleveland, ohio. And then 1946, right after the second world war, he joining the Washington Post where he spent the rest of his career, and he died about six weeks after his last cartoon appeared in the Washington Post. His last cartoon appeared on august 26th, 2001. And he died just a week shy of his 92nd birthday in october. The library of congress has the herblock collection. We had about 16,000 of his editorial cartoons, but we have nearly all of the work he produced for the Washington Post. He did give away cartoons to friends but we have the majority of his output. So mr. Block drew cartoons about president s from hoover to the second george bush. So, you get to see how his career evolved. How his opinions changed. See how he drew particular president s. Obviously, ive just got on a selection of cartoons to give a sense of how he perceived different president s and how his style evolved. The first cartoon we have is about Herbert Hoover who is the president president that mr. Block covered. And it showed hoover at the rapidan camp. Before camp david existed. Hoover care offed a camp further down in the shenandoah mountains, in rapidan, virginia, mr. Block has predicted hoover leading a couple of capitalists to his camp. And theyre fishing, and then, instead of getting economic benefits in the perhaps form of cash incentives, the capitalist gets some fresh fish to sell. Its a pen and ink style. Its on a very smooth board. This is typical of what would have been produced in the midwest at this point in time. So, the second cartoon, i brought out today is about fdr, Franklin Delano roosevelt. And mr. Bloc has not yet come to a point where hes embracing the Democratic Party yet. And so what youre seeing is a cartoon that makes fun of roosevelt for being unable to add Additional Supreme Court justices, to therefore, force congress to implement his plan to improve the economy. Of course, we know that ultimately roosevelt prevailed. And the new deal passed, but block is making fun of him for wasting time, when he could have been passing legislation by trying to implement the court plan to add six more justices to the court. Here we have both candidates for president in 1948. Truman and dewey. Gesturing to a man who looks like a typical character that mr. Block drew to show respectable southern gentleman. And he as recommends congress, block is upset in the aftermath of world war ii. The changes in the immigration plan. Mr. Block was very much in favor of letting displaced people emigrate to the United States. And so, he is showing his disapproval of congress new immigration plan by depicting the statue of liberty pushing people away from the shoulders, rather than embracing their arrival. This is a cartoon about president eisenhower. And hes castigating mr. Block thinking a little too gently Joseph Mccarthy and Richard Nixon for a Smear Campaign against adelaide stevenson, just days before the president ial election. And what you need to know about this cartoon is that it did not run in the Washington Post. The post pulled the cartoon because it was a proeisenhower paper. And mr. Block was prostevenson, and very adamant about that in his cartoons. And they felt that mr. Blocks opinion of eisenhower failing to control mccarthy and nixon went too far. And might, perhaps, persuade voters not to vote for him and so it didnt run. It did run in the areas where mr. Block was syndicated, the other newspapers. What you also need to know about this cartoon is that Washington Post missed it. Readers missed it. They knew a cartoon had appeared elsewhere. It hasnt appeared in their hometown papers and they were angry. And the Washington Post ran every single cartoon that mr. Block chose to draw after that. He had a lot of power at the Washington Post as a cartoonist. We can see mr. Blocks art has evolved from that midwestern pen and inktype drawing to a very loose type style. Much less loose with a little of ink blush and coquille board, a stipple board so it grabs the pencil and gives it a nice texture. He used whiteout both as a way to control his mistakes but also to enhance his image. So, for example, on this canoe being guided by president kennedy, hes got budget written in whiteout, on top of the ink and pencil. So that it stands out in his cartoon. Kennedy was hard for most cartoonists to draw. He was a handsome looking fellow. And even as late as 1962, they really hadnt found like big ears or big nose or something that stood out to make him look funny. And so, he kind of looks generically handsome for the entirety of his administration. That doesnt mean that mr. Block didnt find faults to pick with him. And this particular cartoon is about the kennedy administrations desire to implement tax cuts. But to end some special privileges for people who had been benefited from special tax cuts. Next, we have Lyndon Baines johnson, and mr. Block really admired his war on poverty. He did not admire his war on vietnam. And he loved to take johnson quotes. And misappropriate them in such a way as to attack his policies. So this particular cartoon is, weve shown that were willing to go more than halfway. What mr. Johnson had intended with that quote was to talk about the peace table. Were willing to negotiate terms of peace with north vietnam. But what mr. Block showed was bombing more than halfway up the vietnamese country. If you read the Washington Post between 1972 and 1974, between the time the watergate scandal broke out and the time president nixon resigned, you opened the pages to see 174 cartoons attacking the president on watergate alone. He had drawn nixon coming out of a sewer during the Eisenhower Administration and with the exception of the free shape he gave him as a newly elected president , which is now in the collection of the Washington Post, he never relented. He did not see a good side to it to Richard Nixon which doesnt mean that he attacked him blindly. It meant he had real issues with some of the things, whether it be corruption or wiretapping or things that he didnt that he disliked. And he felt it was his job as a cartoonist to express his opinion. And to share it with others. And thats the basic rule of editorial cartoon is to express an opinion and to persuade people to your point of view. And a good cartoonist does more than just illustrate the news, he gets his point across. Or she gets her point across. So, here we have nixon throwing some tapes to an investigator who is represented by a hound dog, a bloodhound, trying to throw a few reels away while still clutching, perhaps, the most important evidence against him. And we can see the bones of some of his indicted conspirators left behind by the bloodhound. When it came to jimmy carter, herb block saw him as a pretty ineffectual leader. And in particular, the cartoon whos in charge here showing carter banging on his own president ial desk while refusing to take a leadership role. You know, thats probably the most i can say about that particular cartoon. Is that its just what a better way to show somebody that is completely ineffective at their job. Than show them in front of the desk rather than behind it. Herb block was born in chicago and by the time he started drawing editorial cartoons as a teenager he was known as herb. It doesnt take long to figure out if you say it fast and he became known as herblock. And thats how most people know him but he really is herb block. He was not a big fan of Ronald Reagan. His moderate conservative chicago sensibility as a child, the way his parents brought him up was to take care of the poor. You had to look out for the little guy. And what he saw in Ronald Reagan was somebody who was turning a blind eye to the poverty and hunger and other issues that were happening in the United States in the 1980s. And so, we have a redepiction of a homeless person asleep on a grate in washington, d. C. , as Ronald Reagan drives by in his limousine, thinking that those people must have made a bad choice in their lives by not choosing to be rich. And that really underscores mr. Blocks opinions that you really had to help the poor. And you had to understand poverty is an institution. And not make assumptions about why people were poor. He drew a lot of cartoons about the need to support the poor by providing better housing. Better nutrition. Better medical care. We can see, by the end of his career, that herb block had some great ideas. But his drawing is getting a little weaker. The line is not as steady. Hes relying a lot more on crayon than pencil. Pencil has a tendency to smear in a way that wax crayon does not. Here we have George Herbert walker bush denying that he was involved in the iran contra scandal. What herb block is showing while bush is denying his involvement in the scandal, the testimony of the people who were the principal players in the arms for hostages are going to ensnare him anyway. And mr. Block really liked to draw that president bush with rather large lips because, of course, he always was saying to people, read my lips. Next, we have bill clinton. And here hes shown in a masterful attempt at tight rope walking, trying to move a budget forward and keep the Monica Lewinsky scandal at bay. Ms. Lewinsky is not labeled as ms. Lewinsky, but we know that was his intention. And anybody who opened the post that day knew thats exactly what bill clinton was trying to balance. Mr. Block did not work long into george w. Bushs presidency. He was too ill during 9 11 to do anything about that even though apparently people were going to his hospital bedside and encouraging him and saying that they needed his voice. He died in october of 2001. What he did note about george w. Bush was an assumption a lot of cartoonists made early in the election and early in his presidency, and they drew him as stupid. Now, cartoonists who got to live longer came around on that and decided that he wasnt a stupid president. But at this point, thats how herb block is depicting him as under the control of dick cheney and his father. And ignorant about world affairs. And this particular cartoon was actually drawn during the 2000 president ial election. And as you can see, in the last year and a half of his life, that mr. Block, again, the ideas are solid. Hes expressing an opinion. Hes come up with an opinion. And hes able to conceive of a cogent way to express it. But the drawing style is a lot weaker. Hes using that when he cant correct the errors with his pen. So, the white house as an institution, as a substitute for the sitting president appears quite frequently in mr. Blocks cartoons when he wants to talk about policy, rather than personality. And that can be the white house in conflict with congress because, of course, theyre separate parts of government. And mr. Block is quite cognizant of that and brings that up in some of his cartoons. It also can be, with the Supreme Court, although i havent brought any white house versus Supreme Court drawings today. So the first one we have it from president kennedys proclamation that its in light of Martin Luther kings march on washington, that its time for the nation, a century after the american civil war, to fulfill its promise of full quality for all of its citizens. And as you can see, mr. Block is a strong supporter of that. He shows kennedy on top of the white house proudly raising his proclamation as if it were a banner, rather than a speech. The next drawing is very famous. And its something a cartoonist can do and a newspaper reporter cannot. The United States has really strong libel laws which allow cartoonists to express their opinion. Word ward and bernstein had to spend months and find a source to link nixon to the watergate breakin. Within a week of that breakin, mr. Block took foot steps to the white house. He could do that because it was his believe that the watergate scandal as well as other scandals were initiated by nixon. But you notice hes careful not to have drawn nixon in this cartoon because that might have been going a little too far. This cartoon, Catherine Graham winced at and said youre not really going to run that, are you . And when he said, yes, she went okay. She was prepared for the calls that he was going to get the next morning when the paper landed on peoples front porches. Is in this particular cartoon about the clinton administration, we see the white house as a symbol for the Administration Policy on bosnia, making involved in treaty negotiations. And if you know your constitution, you know its not the president who gets to sign treaties, its congress. So, we have the capital and a barricade between the two. And a congressman, a generic congressman saying, he cant do that, we havent agreed to anything yet. So, mr. Block is also explicating for his viewers the people would open his post for the editorial cartoon that there are differences between the u. S. White house and its capitol and occupants. Finally, we have a cartoon about the bush administration. The george w. Bush administration. And mr. Block believed strong in separation of church and state. And he believed that funding for a religious group violated that. And one way he depicted it, of course, was by showing the newspaper headline. But the guy rolling his eyes and looking at the steeple over the white house emphasized the point. That will block believed that george w. Bush had a strong affiliation with religious groups. Christian religious groups in particular. One of the issues that mr. Block drew cartoons about for decades was equality and civil rights. He really believed that africanamericans deserved an extra chance and an equal opportunity. Eight years afters passage of brown versus the board of education which was supposed to segregate everybody and give everybody an equal education in 1952, he pointed out that still was not the case. There were states in the country that had chosen to shutter their Public Schools rather than desegregate. We have a little africanamerican girl holding a birthday cake. Shes telling the white gentleman standing next to her that shes 8. And the James Crow Public School is on the other side of the fence. Shes locked out. Mr. Block would republish this cartoon every year for 15 years. Until Public Schools were accessible to children. It didnt mean he stopped hammering on issues of race and inequality. He never stopped hammering on that. But this cartoon appeared in the Washington Post many times, to remind readers that there was not equality everywhere. This cartoon was drawn in the immediate aftermath of the kennedy assassination. John f. Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald on november 22nd, 1963, with an Assault Rifle that oswald had ordered from an email catalog. So this was a fake advertisement as if it had come from a mail order catalog, encouraging people to purchase weapons. And notice that its sportsmen kid maniacs this was having some are important to block. He believed strongly in gun control. He had drawn cartoons on that issue from the 1950s that they were a solution to nothing. But what really angered him was the access that mail ordering gave to people who had no business owning a weapon. And you sense the anger in this drawing. The exclamation point. The sarcasm. Hes using a variety of tools. As his hand and its mostly text space. As you can see that the rifle is the center, but its really the text that makes that point. In this particular cartoon. Welcome to the herb block gotry. This is a Space Dedicated by mr. Block and we are looking back 50 years ago. Right now, were looking at cartoons from 1967 but in march, well switch to cartoons from 1968. We rotate every six months in march and then september. What i try to do for people is select five cartoons that situate them in events related to the year. Five cartoons about 1967. And a little tweak, i try to pick things that will resonate sometimes more successfully than others. With people saying, oh that could be drawn today. I cant believe were still dealing with that 50 years later. For example, we have this cartoon about the redwood forest being sold to timber and mining interests. Actually, mr. Blocks very first cartoon was about clear cutting in 1929. He was an adamant supporter of nature and american flora and beauty. The vietnam war was very important. In 1967, johnson escalated the war by increased bombing in north vietnam. And as you could see it was mr. Blocks opinion that increased bombing will just lead to more bombing. He has this john g. Public, this american figure climbing up very cautiously, as youre seeing steps of weapons. Another thing to note about this is that its a really strong graphite drawing that is pencil. And graphite is a lubricant and that is why the whiteout is peeling off the drawing. Weve done our best to blew it back on but some of it is gone forever. I mentioned before, mr. Block thought it was important to look out for the little guy. And this is a cartoon that just really brings that truth to bear. You see truth in lending bill being offered to a businessman who holds a whip and says theyre simple happy folk with knowledge that would just confuse them. This is about consumers. Especially poor consumers who dont often have money to pay for goods outright. And so they pay over time. And often pay more than 100 of the original cost of the object, by the time theyre done paying offer. Off. And in this was done before credit cards were really widely available so credit would have come directly from the store. Not to say that credit card bills not when when theyre not paid off promptly dont also lead to paying more than 100 from the good. But this is really about people taking out loans directly from stores and about legislation that made it more transparent about what those charges would lead to. Heres an example of mr. Block looking at an International Issue and that is at egypt under abdul nasser. Nasser had suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of the israelis sixday war in 1967. Here, block has portrayed him as having a napoleon complex, when in reality, nasser was pulling back from extremism, realizing that he didnt have the financial wherewithal to continue fighting the israelis and trying to meet his agenda so this is a case perhaps where history has come down more on the side of nasser than herb block. Charles schultz and herb block were good friends. And they often did Little Things to honor one another. Mr. Schultz not so much in his peanuts cartoons. He was a big fan of herb block personally. But here we have the timehonored character of snoopy cursing communism. Communists in general, and snoopy represents bombhappy generals. And thats another kind of vietnam cartoon. American generals wishing that they could bomb more in vietnam and win the war. One of the things i like to do is select five cartoons that relate to a series of events or a particular event in 1967, something that stands out in mr. Blocks work. And for me, what stood out in 1967 was how important it was to look out for consumers. Whether they were people purchasing automobiles or people who were smoking cigarettes or eating tainted meat, mr. Block did a series of cartoons that highlighted the work of individuals in promoting better consumer regulation, Better Safety for americans. So, we have the food and Drug Administration with the pharmaceutical industry. And americans deceased from inadequate warnings. Could we could we have drawn this cartoon today . Perhaps. Ill let you be the judge. Mr. Block had suffered a heart attack in 1959. And quit smoking. And he never gave up fighting about cigarettes after that. He hated cigarette smoking. He hated what the cigarette industry was doing to people to encourage them to smoke. And so, here hes showing the federal trade commission valiantly attempting to fight advertisers in order to give more controls on what they say. More truth in advertising on what was in the products that people were smoking to protect consumers. Most people remember consumer ralph nader for unsafe at any speed. But in 1967, he took on the Meat Industry in order to have stricter regulations about what went into processed foods to make them safer for consumers to eat. This cartoon reminds me of Upton Sinclair who exposed tainted meat in his book the jungle in 1906. And Upton Sinclair and ralph nader were both brought to washington and offered an award by president johnson for their work in improving consumer safety in food products. One of the issues in 1967 that attracted herb blocks attention was overcharging americans for drugs. Sometimes, the pharmaceutical industry would charge 4,000 of what it costs to produce a pill. And not everybody was treated the same. Some markets, especially heavily populated markets paid less for drugs than some rural areas. So this is a double inadequacy in how things were promoted to people. The caption is, look at all of the research we have to do. Its hard to imagine today that was a time when the seat belt was not part of the automobile. In 1967, researchers realized that americans would be a lot safer in automobiles if there was a seat belt to restrain them during an accident. It would prevent them in hitting steer wheel and the dashboard and would reduce injuries and the Automobile Industry pushed back. And the caption for this particular cartoon is our alibi will be that the safety belt created extra foot pressure on the accelerator. It may surprise a lot of people to learn that the library of congress houses cartoons. We have 128,000 prints and 460 of those are by mr. Block. And its important to save them for several reasons. First, they document american creativity. One of the missions of the library of congress is to document the creativity and the intelligence of the american people. And preserve it for future generations. Finally, i think its a mark of a free society. That we can gather opinions with which we do not agree and collect them and preserve them for future generations. A lot of countries where nobody would dare do that. Were steps from u. S. Capital and a variety of opinions and variety of cartoonists and mr. Block is just a great example of one of the artists we have collected. And people who are over 16 can come and look at originals in the reading room. Anybody can come here to the herb block gallery and see ten originals on the wall. Whenever the library of congress is open to the public. Were featuring American History tv programs as a preview of whats available every weekend on c span 3. Tonight we show you remarks from the annual lincoln forum. Which takes we are going to look at today,
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