Banking and Law

George Harris 

Here we see power symbolized and pretty clearly the province of the elite. On the left are well-dressed attorneys reading at the law- as if there were no economic or political crisis outside. A "register" of lawyers lists at first some well-known San Francisco attorneys of the time, but also some famous attorneys including Abraham Lincoln and Clarence Darrow. The law books extend into the "gun-slit" window, which has been turned into a bookshelf with a pipe resting on the sill. 

To the right, two armed guards watch over the handling of gold at the (new) Federal Reserve Bank, created the year before to prevent a repeat of the devastating bank crisis of 1932-3. They are guarding the thing few people at the time had: Money. It's clear that there's plenty of it, but the ordinary person is barred from it (the guard on the right is caretaker Brady). 

Above them, men are busily recording the share prices on the stock market on the old chalkboard, while the modern stock ticker machine does its relentless work. (The ticker, along with the telephone, ties Harris' work into the adjacent tall figure, "Banker" to the right). The trend charts show graphically what's happened to the economy. 

It's worth some close scrutiny of all the books. In the window, the titles slowly shift from those of real law books to the "Laws of Bridge," the "Laws of Averages," and even the "Laws of Fresco Painting." And a scan of the books below reveals a "sociogram" of Harris' fellow artists (and a set of inside jokes) as their names are included as the "authors" of often-unflattering book titles like Rape, Mayhem, and Married Women. Also underneath the window is a small figure that quotes one part of Ralph Stackpole's sculpture at the Stock Exchange, with the initials "RS" inscribed of the many artists who depicted Stackpole in their work here.