1942.02.16 “For the Duration”
by Ralph Lee (1906-1947)
14.7 x 23.2 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.
India’s political differences with Britain are disappearing, for now.
By February 16, Britain is under extreme pressure in Asia (Singapore will fall the next day), and Indian independence tensions are acute. The US Congress urges self-governance, while Britain insists the issue be postponed until after the war. American opinion is increasingly uncomfortable with colonialism, but reluctant to fracture the alliance.
This is politics as performance. “POOF” And the longstanding, serious disagreements, deeply rooted in questions of sovereignty, are reduced to a puff of smoke.
“For the Duration” was ubiquitous in early WWII rhetoric: contracts, alliances, censorship, civil liberties, postponed reforms. It’s a moral suspension clause. Everyone has agreed not to look under the table until the war is over. “India” is made to wait while others manage the illusion.
The cartoon captures how solutions were imagined in the moment, not how they eventually failed or succeeded.
