WASHINGTON, DC, February 19, 2007 — Jim Morin of the Miami Herald today was named the winner of the 2007 Herblock Prize for editorial cartooning.
The Herblock Prize is awarded annually for distinguished examples of original editorial cartooning that exemplify the courageous independent standard set by the late Washington Post cartoonist. The winner receives a $10,000 tax-free prize.
Morin will be awarded the prize at an April 4 ceremony at the Library of Congress where former NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw will deliver the 2007 Herblock Lecture.
The Herblock Prize was created by The Herb Block Foundation to encourage editorial cartooning as an essential journalistic tool in preserving the rights of the American people.
"Political cartoons, unlike sundials, do not show the brightest hours," Herblock once wrote. "They often show the darkest ones in the hope of helping us move to brighter times."
It is in that spirit that this year's judges awarded the 2007 Herblock Prize to Morin whose own interest in editorial cartooning began in earnest with the Watergate scandals.
"He just gets better and better, he keeps growing," said Jeff Danziger, winner of the 2006 Herblock Prize and a judge in this year's contest. He said the judges were particularly impressed by both the artistic quality and message of Morin's cartoons.
Harry Katz, Foundation curator and judge in this year's contest, praised Morin for his "impressive, unrelenting barrage of cartoons and caricatures displaying artistry, courage and conviction."
Morin said Herblock was an inspiration for him when he was in college at Syracuse University in the 1970s. "One day my mom said 'why don't you do what Herblock's doing.'" he said. After two brief stints as a cartoonist in Beaumont, Texas and Richmond, Virginia, Morin was hired by the Miami Herald in 1978 where he has been ever since.
In 1996, Morin won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning and shared the prize in 1983 with other members of the Miami Herald editorial board. He has also won the Thomas Nast Award, the John Fischetti Award and the Berryman Award for his work.
The Herb Block Foundation was created in Herb Block's will as a grant-making organization with a mission of defending basic freedoms, combating all forms of discrimination and improving the conditions of the poor and providing post-secondary educational opportunities to financially needy students.
The Foundation has made a gift of Herb Block's entire archives, including more than 14,000 original cartoons, to the Library of Congress to allow both scholars and the public to share the history of his times.
Herb Block is among the world’s best known and most admired political cartoonists. Born on October 13, 1909, the native Chicagoan spent his 72-year career fighting against abuses of the powerful.