Missouri Courtroom

William Josiah Brickey, Missouri Courtroom, 1852, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1974.112
Copied William Josiah Brickey, Missouri Courtroom, 1852, oil on canvas, 29 1⁄8 x 36 in. (74.0 x 91.5 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1974.112
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Artwork Details

Title
Missouri Courtroom
Artist
Date
1852
Location
Dimensions
29 1⁄8 x 36 in. (74.0 x 91.5 cm)
Credit Line
Museum purchase
Mediums
Mediums Description
oil on canvas
Classifications
Keywords
  • Figure group
  • Animal — dog
  • Occupation — law — judge
  • Cityscape — Missouri
  • State of being — other — poverty
  • Occupation — law — lawyer
  • Architecture Interior — civic — courthouse
Object Number
1974.112
Linked Open Data
https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/1974.112

Artwork Description

The participants in this courtroom scene focus their attention on a fair-skinned man dressed in rags, possibly one of the thousands of Irish immigrants who had escaped the potato famine and made their way to Missouri. These farmers settled in urban areas where they hired out as day laborers, struggling to get by with little income and no property of their own. (Parrish, gen. ed., A History of Missouri, vol. II, 1972) The men who sit in judgment are clearly more prosperous, and this painting evokes the mixed welcome that generations of European immigrants experienced in nineteenth-century America.