In Her Path

Charles Dana Gibson's 1917 ink drawing deploys the allegorical vocabulary of classical triumph to argue for American entry into the World War on the side of democracy. A muscular female figure wearing a headband lettered DEMOCRACY sits astride a defeated horned head labeled AUTOCRACY—a thinly veiled stand-in for Imperial Germany—pinning it beneath her foot while gripping a broken lance. At lower left, a second crushed skull lies underfoot. Above and to the right, a winged angelic figure radiating light holds aloft a banner reading PEACE, beckoning toward the victor. The composition moves left-to-right from darkness and violence into luminous resolution.