Midterm Primary Source

For my midterm paper, I will be exploring a Harper's Weekly image called "the Ignorant Vote - Honors are Easy". The image is a Thomas Nast image from December 4th 1876, depicting a Black man and an Irish man sitting on a scale, the Black man representing the South, and the Irish man representing the North. The image appears to represent fears of the country that the political and social makeup of the U.S. at the time was going to be represented by "lesser", non-White groups. For my paper I want to explore the evolution and conception of "whiteness" in reference to "blackness"; meaning that I believe that within the political and religious connotations of the image,  the definitions of what it is to be white was in opposition to the American conception of blackness. In essence, immigrant groups like the Irish represents not only changing definitions and therefore the social constructions of "whiteness" and race generally, but also the American tradition of defining "white" on the backs of and opposition to "black".