1942.07.10 “Enforcing the Noise Ordinance”
by Ralph Lee (1906-1947)
14.7 x 23.3 in., ink on board
Coppola Collection
Ralph Lee was an editorial cartoonist for the Portland Oregonian. He died suddenly, at 41, in January 1947. His cousin, Art Bimrose, was the editorial cartoonist for the Oregonian for more than three decades. In 1937, the Oregonian hired him part-time to work on printing plates. Following Lee’s death, Bimrose was hired as the Sunday editorial cartoonist.
Lee is reacting to a cluster of domestic enforcement actions that had just moved from controversy into normalization.
The June 1942 Nazi saboteurs case (Ex parte Quirin). On June 12–27, 1942: Eight German agents landed by submarine in Florida and Long Island. They were captured within days. On June 27, Roosevelt announced they would be tried by military tribunal, not civilian court. On July 8, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld this. Lee’s cartoon appears July 10, two days later.
The case established that enemy agents operating under civilian cover do not enjoy normal constitutional protections, and the government could summarily remove them from public life. Uncle Sam-as-policeman dragging “Hans” offstage is a direct visual echo of that legal decision.
Indeed, by early July 1942, German-language radio programs were being curtailed or forced off the air, and foreign-language newspapers were under pressure to publish in English, submit translations, or suspend publication. The German is singing from Mein Kampf is being shut down.
The Smith Act (1940) was suddenly being used aggressively, as pro-fascist speakers and organizations were arrested or dissolved. The press was actively debating: How much speech is too much speech in wartime? Lee answers that question bluntly: The sign “Free American Singing Society” invokes First Amendment ideals. But this isn’t “speech,” it’s noise. Fascist speech isn’t being “argued against,” it’s being regulated out of public space.
“Enforcing the Noise Ordinance” reframes wartime censorship and internment measures as municipal housekeeping.
