Spotprent waarin een bisschop de liberale dagbladen vertrapt, 1875 1875

This is a political cartoon made in 1875 by Johan Michaël Schmidt Crans. It depicts a Catholic bishop trampling on newspapers. With him is a drummer, a detail that adds to the visual rhetoric. The image operates as political propaganda. The bishop and his drummer represent the Catholic Church in the Netherlands, re-establishing its power after centuries of repression. The newspapers under the bishop's feet are liberal publications that opposed the church's resurgence. This was a period in which the traditionally Protestant Netherlands struggled to come to terms with the re-emergence of Catholicism as a political force. The image is clearly partisan, siding with liberal elements of Dutch society against the perceived threat of Catholic authoritarianism. To understand this cartoon fully, the historian needs to examine Dutch political and religious history of the 19th century as well as understanding the institutional history of Dutch newspapers and the re-establishment of the Catholic Church.