Content note: Cartoon quoting an anti-suffrage argument about women's emotional fitness for jury duty, answered by showing weeping male jurors. This object is shown as it was published. Why
"Women are too sentimental for jury duty" -- Anti-Suffrage argument (Puck cartoon)
Under the caption quoting an anti-suffrage argument, a jury box of men weeps into handkerchiefs and holds up a 'Not Guilty' sign while a man at the right embraces a woman. The cartoon answers the claim by pointing to the same trait in the men who make it, rather than by testing whether sentiment affects verdicts.
- Date
- January 23, 1915
- Period
- First World War
- Made by
- Puck (Puck Publishing Corporation, New York); cartoonist Kenneth Russell Chamberlain
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Cartoon
- Issuer type
- Media
- Regime
- Wilson Administration
- Leader
- Woodrow Wilson
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Techniques
- Whataboutism
- Regime
- Wilson administration
- Leader
- Woodrow Wilson
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Library of Congress, retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain in the U.S. (published before 1931)
Chamberlain, Kenneth Russell, 1891-1984, artist. New York: Puck Publishing Corporation, 1915 January 23. Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2011660530/.
Text on the object
"Women are too sentimental for jury duty." -- Anti-Suffrage argument. [sign held up in the picture: NOT GUILTY] [signature top right: Chamberlain]
