The Cop and the Anthem

“The Cop and the Anthem” is often categorized as a work of “humor” due to its lighthearted tone and ironic, unexpected twist ending. Below the surface, however, is an indictment of Social Class and the Cycle of Poverty and Crime, as well as of the very notion of “Freedom” and the American Dream.

Notably, the story takes place in New York City, a place associated with optimism and opportunity. At the turn of the 20th century, immigrants, business owners, artists, and factory workers flocked to the city en masse, hanging their hopes on the promise of “making it big” or at least achieving a steady income, a stable home, and the ability to provide for one’s family. For Soapy, however, even the latter, more modest goal seems wholly out of reach. As an unhoused man, his aspirations do not extend beyond basic necessities—principally food and shelter. The approach of winter makes the need to secure these necessities more urgent, and O. Henry implies that Soapy has learned to work the era’s excessively punitive penal system to his advantage. Every year, Soapy apparently gets himself arrested for a minor offense like public intoxication or petty theft, which ensures he will have a warm home for the winter. While this serves his interests in the short term, it also further cements his position in society: Soapy’s latest arrest and conviction is yet another mark on his record, and when he emerges from prison as a free man in the spring, he will once again be jobless and unhoused, trying to figure out where to get his next bite of food and where to sleep at night.

For most of the narrative, Soapy does not reflect too deeply on this problem. In fact, his frequent references to himself as a “gentleman” suggest that he sees himself as having found a niche in society. Though his way of gaming the system is less socially sanctioned, he sees it as no more exploitative than the wealthiest Americans’ lifestyles, and the story itself implies that it is probably considerably less exploitative. There is, for example, no fundamental difference between Soapy’s theft of the umbrella and its supposed owner’s theft of it; if anything, Soapy’s reasons for stealing the umbrella—to secure food and board—are more sympathetic than those of the well-dressed man, who presumably took it as a status symbol.

Similarly, Soapy strives to maintain a sense of self-respect amid his poverty, which is why he resists going to a shelter. Because Personal Dignity Is Essential to Survival, the forced showers and intrusive personal questions that come with such “charity” strike Soapy as worse than being a prisoner. In his own way, Soapy has embraced the American ideal of independence even before the change of heart that the church anthem brings about. He is committed to being his own man; going to prison is merely the way he “take[s] care of himself” (35).

The story’s pathos therefore arises not only from Soapy’s thwarted redemption, but rather from the fact that the policeman’s misunderstanding of him in the church replicates a pattern that repeats throughout the work. Soapy may see himself as having a modest place in society, but no one else grants him even this meager dignity. Those around him either misunderstand or ignore his intentions and wishes: A policeman mistakes him for a privileged college student and lets him go, a waiter refuses to call the police merely because Soapy asks him to, etc. Such mistakes are often mutual. Despite Soapy’s implied familiarity with New York’s criminal underworld and justice system, he fails to anticipate the policeman’s response to him smiling after breaking a window, and he does not recognize the woman he approaches as a sex worker. It is only when he commits to turning his life around that he finally “succeeds” in doing what he has been trying to do all along: getting arrested. This ironic reversal underscores Soapy’s utter lack of agency and his marginalization from society at large.