J O I N, or D I E

This political cartoon by Benjamin Franklin is showing that if all the colonies don’t join as one, they will die.

Note; the ‘JOIN, or DIE.’

Each of the pieces of the snake are the eight colonies that should put together to make one. If these colonies just want to stay single, and decide not to join to each other, there might be wars against one another and other colonies from other continents. Then, these colonies would have to fight back alone unless they made allies. But if they all stay as one, America, it is much harder for any of the other colonies to attack and if they were to fight back, they would be able to fight back as a one, whole, strong army. The cartoonist, Benjamin Franklin, made this to show everyone that if they want to win whatever happens to them, they need to stay as one. Benjamin Franklin was one of the founding fathers of America, so he is the one who put all of America together, and he wanted to show the people with this cartoon. His opinion in this cartoon is that they should be strong and all join as one. The evidence for this is the slogan. It says in the slogan ‘JOIN, or DIE’ which shows that he thinks that they should all just…JOIN. Benjamin could have made this better by turning the face of the snake towards the audience so they can see the snakes’ facial expression more and show more visual effects. Having the snakes face sideways doesn’t show much about how the snake is feeling or how vicious the snake may look, if it does.