Number 625


The comic book civics lesson


If a United States senator is having a tough time getting his bill passed through the regular American lawmaking process he can always resort to what the villains in "Forged Faces" did in Uncle Sam Quarterly #1, Autumn 1941. Just replace the senators and congressmen--even the President--with lookalikes.

In this comic book civics lesson from the Will Eisner crew the Bill of Rights can be changed by mere votes, instead of a Constitutional amendment. Tsk tsk. It's a good thing it's not that easy to change the Constitution or those rights would've been gone years ago.

Despite its silliness I like this story. I'm not sure that Uncle Sam, an enduring American symbol, was a good comic book character. Maybe it's because he was already a symbol before Eisner and Co. got ahold of him. He's still a symbol, and although he was revived by DC with a bunch of other Quality Comics heroes in the 1970s he didn't last past the end of the war in his own title (which became Blackhawk), or his lead spot in National Comics.

According to the Grand Comics Database Eisner did the splash page and may have written the story, and Dan Zolnerowich pencilled pages 2-16. The inker is unknown.