“The American River Ganges” was a full-page editorial cartoon drawn by Thomas Nast and published in the September 30, 1871, issue of Harper’s Weekly and republished in the magazine in 1875. The cartoon was accompanied by an essay written by Eugene Lawrence. Lawrence, a frequent contributor to the magazine, was a nativist who blamed Catholics for what he saw as the demise of the public school system. He argued that “to destroy our free schools, and perhaps our free institutions has been for many years the constant aim of the extreme section of the Romish Church.” The essay attacks Jesuits and Irish Catholics, who, Lawrence argues, govern New York because of an unholy alliance between Tammany Hall, the political society run by the politician William “Boss” Tweed, and Irish Catholic immigrants, who looked to Tammany Hall for patronage— and who often received it by pledging to vote for the Democratic political candidates the society supported.