"A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion,"Harper’s Weekly,
January 15, 1870, p.48. Wood
engraving
The donkey first appeared
as a symbol for the Democratic Party
in the 1830s when the Democrat Andrew Jackson was President. The donkey
continued in American political commentary as a symbol for the Democratic
Party thereafter. Thomas Nast built upon this legacy and used his extraordinary
skill to amplify it. For a time, the rooster also served as the symbol
of the Democratic Party, but gradually the donkey replaced it in popular
usage after the 1880s. Nast first used the donkey as a symbol for the
Democratic Party in "A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" published
January 15, 1870, in Harper's Weekly to comment on Northern Democrats
(nicknamed Copperheads) dealings with Edwin M. Stanton, Lincoln's Secretary
of War.
