Introduction

‘Join or Die’ is a famous political cartoon, drawn by Benjamin Franklin. It was the first published cartoon by Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette on May 9, 1754. The cartoon highlighted some of the Franklin’s editorials concerning the separated republics of colonies. Also, it portrays his ideologies concerning the benefits of colonial togetherness (Kulikoff, 2017). The artwork shows the early Americans colonies. The snake picture is cut into eight slices with each segment labelled with the initials of American colonies. Such colonies include New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. New England, Georgia and Delaware are not part of the communities because they were new and they were disunited, and Franklin’s point was all about building colonial unity. Additionally, this cartoon symbolizes the need to join with the British to defeat the French and Indians (Kulikoff, 2017).

In the middle of the eighteenth century, a hostile controversial debate arose between Britain and Native American allies concerning the owner of the vast land west of the Appalachian Mountains. American colonies were being ruled by the British bureaucratic government system. Americans had a lot of responsibilities to accomplish, but the British Republic gave them no chance to exercise their rights. Famous colonist, Benjamin realized the predicament facing his motherland and dedicated his effort to ensure the thirteen groups settle on a decision concerning which side to battle along with if the conflict was to a rise. Moreover, Franklin stipulated that verdict has to be unanimous since if colonies were not in peace with each other, then they would split and ran out of control from the American power (Herskovits, 2013).

As a result of this rhetorical pressure, Benjamin scripted the renowned political cartoon ‘Join or Die’ in 1754 under the Pennsylvania Gazette because he was aware of the enormous number of people who can view the cartoon. He was very sure of the approach he selected to post it because he understood the escalation happening in his country and intentionally hid the author because it could draw no purpose concerning the rhetorical situation. The primary message of the article was to make sure that the American colonist join and face the upcoming battles as one English entity. The theme of ‘Join or Die’ used a symbol of a snake to characterize directly the target audience who were the American colonists and England during the start of the French and Indian war.

Franklin used the slogan of Join or Die to influence the attention of his audiences. The first phrase of the motto was join that brought a significant impact because it appealed the ethos. Franklin used the solitary word to show that it is the colonist ethical responsibility to participate since they were under the American leadership and same economic function. Therefore, this made them become more obligated to ally with American side as one unit. Additionally, Franklin formed another solitary word ‘Die’ which was compelling and pleasing the logos. The single word implied how the French held Indian helpers that were close to the colonist and these brutal groups might invade their regions after taking the territory of west Appalachians.

Consequently, the meaningful standing option for settlers to exercise was to unite militaries with one another and Britain defence or rather perish in wars. The Join or Die Franklin motto was adequately attributed to his presentation. He totally uses three words in the carton to clearly portray the complete implication of each of them.

Subsequently, the same audiences who were appealed by ‘Join or Die’ slogan would feel a great link towards the cartoon upon analysis because the characters used in it reflected their homes. The image used by Franklin in ‘Join or Die’ is a snake that is cut into eight distinct slices (Scully, 2014). The slices signified the thirteen American colonies. Delaware territory was out of Franklin’s illustration because it was not part of Pennsylvania at the time of publication. Georgia was excluded from the other colonies because it was new and referred as a defenceless frontier area that would bring nothing to common security.

Lastly, the New England was regarded as one colony, instead of four distinct segments. Franklin’s choice of place towards his audience aligned with their geographical location. Since the tail was pointing south; this was the southernmost colony along the American coastline. On the other hand, the tail was pointing north, and that segment was termed as the northernmost colonies geographically (Kulikoff, 2017).

In addition, Franklin planned his movement structure with a woodcut of a snake to signify the fallacy that might influence his viewers upon their analysis. There existed an allegory kind of a myth that said if a snake was to be sliced into parts it could come back to existence before sunset (Herskovits, 2013).  This depicted the colonist’s situation since the colonies were separated due to the controversy over which group to support during the time of the coming war between Indian versus French. He addressed the pathos’ readers by instilling fear in them. Franklin was determined to impose a new sense of urgency to his viewers for the upcoming wars and came to a realization that they should be prepared so as to put back the pieces of the snake together.

Correspondingly, Join or Die as well talks about ethics by it often used in America from the time of creation until modernity. For example, Franklin campaigns were very persuasive on people in the eighteenth-century during the start of wars (Scully, 2014). Before the American Revolution, ‘Join or Die’ would regularly be identified on prints as well as magazines as the crying platform for partisans who ironically planned to go against British rulers (Herskovits, 2013). Likewise in contemporary beliefs, ‘Join or Die’ is depicted in various attributes as a way of coming and forming a strong military troop.

Evidently, Benjamin’s ‘Join or Die’ movement demonstrates to be an epitome of an undoubted segment by employing different rhetorical techniques to convince not only colonists in the eighteenth century but also persons in today’s culture.

‘Join or Die’ cartoon has used both the visual and written words to portray the exact message Franklin want to pass across. In conclusion, Franklin editorial illustration reflects the thesis to elaborate the advantages of colonial togetherness brilliantly. He plainly sowed the seed of togetherness in the frontier of pending American Revolution, in a couple of years in the future.

References

Herskovits, A. (2013). Join, Or Die: America’s first political cartoon. Constitution Daily. Retrieved fromhttps://constitutioncenter.org/blog/join-or-die-americas-first-political-cartoon/

Kulikoff, A. (2017). Benjamin Franklin and the Theater of Empire. Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, 141(1), 77-90.

Scully, R. (2014). Accounting for Transformative Moments in the History of the Political Cartoon. International Journal of Comic Art, 16(2), 332-364.

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