Sale 2486, Part I - The Harold Holzer Collection of Lincolniana, September 27, 2018

112 c   (PRINTS—CARTOONS.) The Political Rail Splitter. Lithograph, 10 x 15 1 / 2 inches; minor wear and soiling, a few light scuff marks, laid down on stiff paper. New York: J. Leach, [1860] [1,500/2,500] Lincoln has chopped down the tree of the Union, and is splitting the trunk between North and South using the wedge of “irrepressible conflict” and an axe featuring the head of an African American, while trampling the Constitution. His allies Horace Greeley and William Seward (author of the “irrepressible conflict” warning) are in the background. Scarcer than most of the Lincoln cartoons; we are aware of only one other at auction since 1912, and OCLC lists copies at only 2 institutions. Weitenkampf, page 123. 113 c   (PRINTS—CARTOONS.) The Grave of the Union, or Major Jack Downing’s Dream. Lithograph, 18 3 / 4 x 22 inches; folds, heavy wear and moderate soiling, lacking 2 inches of upper right corner, also a band of loss about 1 / 2 inch wide extending along a vertical fold through the left part of the image, inked stamp reading “microfilmed” in lower margin, extensive paper repairs and reinforcements on verso. New York: Bromley & Co., 1864 [500/750] A bitter anti-Lincoln satire produced for the Copperhead market, attacking the alleged administration’s abuse of the Constitution. Horace Greeley and Senator Charles Sumner are shown laying the Constitution’s casket into a grave, with Greeley gloating “I guess we’ll bury it so deep that it will never get up again.” Lincoln asks “Chase, will it stay down?” to which Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase answers, “My God, it must stay down, or we shall all go up!” Other caskets marked “Free speech,” “Habeas corpus,” and “Union” await burial. The abolitionist Rev. Henry Ward Beecher presides over the funeral holding an African- American baby, intoning “Not thy will, oh Lord! But mine be done.” Second state, with the headline “Political Caricature No. 1.” A defective example of an important print. Reilly 1864-37.