"Join or Die" Analysis

Benjamin Franklin's famous cartoon "Join or Die" strongly displays his views on the colonies during the French and Indian war. Franklin believed that the colonies stood little chance against the French, as the French had "the very great advantage of being under one Direction, with one Council, and one Purse." Franklin declared that 13 individual and disunited colonies, even with the help of their beloved Britain, stood no chance against a powerful and united mass of French and Indians who were completely capable of coming to common agreements, working together, and following one law. Also, the distance from North America to Europe was a great danger for the colonists; with so far between the two, the French felt that they could break all treaties held by France and Britain, seeing them as canceled out by the distance.







Indeed, the distance did add a great danger for the colonists. The French were killing, siezing, and imprisoning British traders, taking their belongings, murdering and scalping farmers, and taking over whatever parts of the British colonies they desired. Franklin's cartoon depicts that disunited, the colonies were incapable of fighting back. Joined together, they could effectively battle to defend their own rights, beliefs, and even lives.

The "Join or Die" cartoon was created by Benjamin Franklin to portray to the colonies the importance of unification. Each colony was represented (Though four colonies were combined into New England, and Delaware and Georgia were completely left out for unknown reasons). At about this time there was a superstition that if a snake was cut up, then the parts put back together before sunset, the snake would come back to life. Franklin wished to portray that the same went for the colonies: if they united before the war ended, they could succeed. If they didn't unite, they would be murdered by the French. This same cartoon was later used during the American Revolution to portray the same message.

Benjamin Franklin also created another political cartoon, this one entitled Magna Britania: Her Colonies Reduc'd.

This cartoon depicts Britain as a young woman, with her limbs cut off and spread out around her. This cartoon was intended to display that if the colonies were destroyed, Britain would be, too.