Ladies and gentlemen: Stick to the trusts. They’re your only true friends.
Don’t you see how happy they’ve made you? by Homer Davenport
Plate XLIII from The Dollar or the Man, the Issue of To Day, 1900
Originally published in the New York Journal newspaper
7 1/2 "w x 10 1/4 "h

In the cartoon above, Davenport shows Republican operative Mark Hanna as the protector of the trusts. He pontificates on their altruistic benevolence as one of the trusts crouches in hiding, club in hand..

Detail of
Ladies and gentlemen: Stick to the trusts. They’re your only true friends.
Don’t you see how happy they’ve made you? by Homer Davenport

The screen is decorated with a cornucopia, a traditional symbol of prosperity, but in place of the customary fruit, flowers and grain, coins spill out. In folklore, the cornucopia was filled with whatever the owner desired. In this cartoon, it is placed on a device of concealment shared by Hanna and the Trust.

Detail of
Ladies and gentlemen: Stick to the trusts. They’re your only true friends.
Don’t you see how happy they’ve made you? by Homer Davenport

The overweight Hanna addresses an emaciated crowd with threadbare clothes as a vision of death hovers above them.

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