---
title: Guerra Vaccino-Obrigateza! (Compulsory-Vaccination War!), O Malho cartoon
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/guerra-vaccino-obrigateza-o-malho-1904/
description: 'A colour cartoon shows a street battle: a column of soldier-nurses in Red Cross caps, led by a moustached commander with a lancet, wheels forward…'
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![Guerra Vaccino-Obrigateza! (Compulsory-Vaccination War!), O Malho cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/guerra-vaccino-obrigateza-o-malho-1904.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/guerra-vaccino-obrigateza-o-malho-1904.jpg)

# Guerra Vaccino-Obrigateza! (Compulsory-Vaccination War!), O Malho cartoon

A colour cartoon shows a street battle: a column of soldier-nurses in Red Cross caps, led by a moustached commander with a lancet, wheels forward syringe-cannon behind a banner reading 'VACCINA OBRIGATORIA' marked with two skulls, while men and women at windows and in the street hurl brooms, saws, axes, pots and slops at them. The printed legend calls Oswaldo Cruz 'the Napoleon of the syringe and lancet'. The tells are that loaded label and the skulls stamped on the vaccination banner.

- **Date:** October 29, 1904
- **Period:** [Pre-1914](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=pre-1914)
- **Made by:** O Malho (Rio de Janeiro), no. 111; cartoon by Leonidas Freire
- **Region:** [Latin America](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=latin-america)
- **Country:** [Brazil](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=brazil)
- **Medium:** [Cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=cartoon)
- **Issuer type:** [Media](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=media)
- **Regime:** [Rodrigues Alves Government](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=rodrigues-alves-government)
- **Leader:** [Francisco de Paula Rodrigues Alves](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=francisco-de-paula-rodrigues-alves)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Persuade or win support](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=persuade-support)
- **Theme:** [Health](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=health)
- **Event:** [Vaccine Revolt](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=vaccine-revolt)
- **Techniques:** [Name-calling](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/name-calling/) [Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Guerra_Vaccino-Obrigateza!.jpg), retrieved September 29, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain (published 1904, before 1931; Commons: author d. 1943, Brazil life+70 expired) O Malho (Rio de Janeiro), no. 111, 29 October 1904, Leonidas Freire, via Wikimedia Commons

## Text on the object

Original (Portuguese) · checked against a source transcription

```
GUERRA VACCINO-OBRIGATEZA!...

[banner:] VACCINA OBRIGATORIA

[signature:] LEONIDAS

[legend, as quoted on the Commons file page:] Espetaculo para breve nas ruas desta cidade: Oswaldo Cruz, o Napoleão da seringa e lanceta, à frente de suas forças obrigatorias, será recebido e manifestado com denodo pela população. O interessante dos combates deixará a perder de vista o das batalhas de flores e da guerra russo-japoneza. E veremos no fim da festa quem será o vaccinador, á força!
```

English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader)

```
COMPULSORY-VACCINATION WAR!...

[banner:] COMPULSORY VACCINE

[signature:] LEONIDAS

[legend:] A spectacle soon in the streets of this city: Oswaldo Cruz, the Napoleon of the syringe and lancet, at the head of his compulsory forces, will be received and demonstrated against with boldness by the population. The interest of the combats will leave far behind that of the battles of flowers and of the Russo-Japanese war. And we shall see at the end of the party who will be the vaccinator, by force!
```

The heading, banner and signature were read from the image ('OBRIGATEZA' in the heading is printed that way, a play on 'obrigatoria'). The legend is not visible in the hosted image and is taken from the caption on the Wikimedia Commons file page, which the file page attributes to O Malho no. 111.

[← "Yamato-damashii no gochisō" (Nihon banzai hyakusen hyakushō print, 1904)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/banzai-hyakusen-yamato-damashii-feast-1904/) ["Julen 1904": the first Christmas seal (Denmark, 1904) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/denmark-first-christmas-seal-1904/)

## Using the same techniques

- [Passional Christi und Antichristi: the emperor kisses the pope's foot (leaf 'Antichristus')](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passional-christi-antichristi-emperor-kisses-pope-1521/) (1521 · Name-calling, Card stacking)
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Ondersoeckt de Geesten, ofse van den Duyvel syn, of niet (the De Witt brothers as devils)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ondersoeckt-de-geesten-de-witt-devils-1672/) (1672 · Scapegoating, Name-calling)
- [The Highlanders Medley, or The Duke Triumphant (A Loyal Song)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/highlanders-medley-duke-triumphant-1746/) (1746 · Name-calling, Transfer)
- [The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770 by a party of the 29th Regt.](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/revere-bloody-massacre-king-street-1770/) (Mar 1770 · Name-calling, Card stacking)
- [Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) (1791 · Name-calling, Transfer)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Exit Liberté a la Francois! or Buonaparte closing the Farce of Egalité, at St. Cloud (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/exit-liberte-buonaparte-gillray-1799/) (Nov 21, 1799 · Name-calling)
