Thomas Nast Portfolio
“What Are You Laughing At? To the Victor Belong the Spoils,”
Harper’s Weekly, November 25, 1871, cover. Wood
engraving.
The anti-Tammany campaign waged
by the New York Times
and Harper’s Weekly
damaged the Democratic machine, leaving
a chastened William Magear Tweed
in charge of a collapsing
organization, symbolized by the ruined pillars
and porticoes of his
fortress. Boss Tweed, the beleaguered gladiator, pretends
bravado, insisting that the spoils—in this case the treasury of New
York City—still goes to the victor, no matter how battered. Nast’s
cartoon is both a crow of victory and a warning that the battle is
not finally won.