“Join, or Die” snake cartoon

The “Join, or Die” snake cartoon is a newspaper image that turns colonial division into a question of whether the colonies can act together. When it is circulated among Duke & Sons’ senior men, the cartoon sharpens a broader disagreement over English allegiance, colonial identity, and the Crown’s regulation of forests.

Appearance and Circulation

The judge passes around a grubby copy of the Pennsylvania Gazette. On its page, a snake is cut into segments, each labeled with one of the colonies, and the motto beneath it reads, “JOIN OR DIE.” The image makes political fragmentation visible: the colonies appear as parts of a single creature, but separated parts cannot form a whole.

Debate Over Union

George responds with impatience at the proliferation of newspapers. Nicolaus recognizes the image as Franklin’s and dismisses its appeal to colonial union as impossible. He argues that many colonists remain English in outlook despite being born in America, while the tobacco colonies differ markedly from the fishing and forest colonies. His response treats colonial interests and loyalties as too divided for the cartoon’s proposed unity.

Piet connects that division to the Crown’s forest legislation, suggesting it has driven a wedge between the colonies and England. The older men ignore his observation. James Pickering counters that colonial hostility to kings and royal officials is longstanding, and adds that American businessmen broadly resent forest regulation. The discussion thus places the cartoon’s call for unity beside a competing account of what divides the colonies: regional differences, lingering English loyalties, and conflict over commercial restrictions.

Significance in the Scene

The cartoon is more than a political emblem in the room: its segmented body gives form to the separation already emerging among the men. For decades, Duke & Sons has maintained a precarious balance between French allegiances and the ambitions of a younger, American-born generation; the exchange makes that strain explicit without resolving it. The newspaper’s image calls for union, while the conversation reveals that the meaning and possibility of union are themselves contested.