Actor E.A. Sothern as Lord Dundreary in the original 1858 cast of Our American Cousin. A monocled man with long, bushy sideburns and wearing a frock coat.
30 July 2021 (8 August: paragraph on the 1997 film Wag the Dog added)
The tail wagging the dog is a metaphorical expression for a minor part directing the actions of the whole. The metaphor is rather obvious, but unlike many such expressions, this one has a definitive origin. It comes from Tom Taylor’s play Our American Cousin, which was first performed in New York on 15 October 1858. The play was enormously popular in its day. So that it gave birth to a popular expression should be no surprise. But today the play is chiefly remembered for being the one that Abraham Lincoln was watching at Ford’s Theater when he was assassinated on 14 April 1865.
The relevant scene in the play goes as follows, a conversation between the characters of Lord Dundreary and Florence:
Dun Well, I'll tell you—a draught. Now, I've got a better one than that: When is a dog's tail not a dog's tail? (FLORENCE repeats. During this FLORENCE, Mrs. M. and DUNDREARY are down stage.)
Dun Yeth, that's a stunner. You've got to give that up.
Flo Yes, and willingly.
Dun When it's a cart. (They look at him enquiringly.[)]
Flo Why, what on earth has a dog's tail to do with a cart?
Dun When it moves about, you know. A horse makes a cart move, so does a dog make his tail move.
Flo Oh, I see what you mean—when it's a wagon. (Wags the letter in her hand.[)]
Dun Well, a wagon and a cart are the same thing, ain't they? That's the idea—it's the same thing.
Flo They are not the same. In the case of your conundrum there's a very great difference.
Dun Now I've got another. Why does a dog waggle his tail!
Flo Upon my word, I never inquired.
Dun Because the tail can't waggle the dog. Ha! ha!
The metaphorical expression, with waggle shortened to wag, appears in print within five years of the play’s premiere. From the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel of 15 August 1863:
It would be wrong to speak of its owner as a man with a nose, or of his face as having a nose to it. It was a nose with a face and a man attached to it. So far from the nose pertaining to the man—the man and all his specialties pertained to the nose.—The man followed the nose on the same principle that a dog wags his tail—because the dog is stronger than the tail, for if he were not the tail would wag the dog.
Another early use, from Burlington Vermont’s Free Press of 15 September 1866 obliquely references the play as the origin. The mention of Dundreary’s dog shows that the writer expected the readers to know the play:
The Reason Why.—“What makes you think,” asked a “conservative” of a Republican, “that the new party will still be controlled by the Democratic party, and that we shall be called upon to support Democratic nominations this fall?” “For the same reason,” was the reply, “that Dundreary’s dog wagged his tail—because the tail isn’t big enough to wag the dog!”—New Haven Palladium.
Early uses of the phrase are often in discussion of politics, as this one from New Orleans’s Daily Picayune of 19 July 1872 shows:
Though Mr. Darwin says this disappearance is forever, we fear he is mistaken. Certain signs are abroad that seem to indicate the danger of a caudal revival. The vague aspirations of the Dolly Varden girl of the period for reversing the decaudalization process, are followed by some ominous symptoms in a small and superfluous political denomination—a superfetation, so to speak, of a sickly and disjointed time—self-named the Liberal party[.] For practical purposes, this association of politicians can hope to be nothing save as an appendage to some other party. But, having heard of the ambitious tail that insisted on wagging the dog, it peremptorily demands to wag the Democratic and Reform combination in this State.
With this exception, the opposition elements are well organized on a footing of intelligent accord. The only obstacle is this little faction that madly dreams of fastening itself to the organization of Democrats and Reformers simply for the purpose of managing it. But the thing is against nature and against logical fitness. The tail can never wag the dog.
The phrase wag the dog got a boost in popularity from the 1997 film of that name (Barry Levinson, Director; David Mamet, Screenplay; starring Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, and Anne Heche) about a plan to fabricate a fictional war between the United States and Albania to cover up a presidential sex scandal. The film was released a month before the Clinton-Lewinsky sex scandal became public. The subsequent bombing of the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan, alleged by the United States to be producing nerve agent for the terrorist group al-Qaeda, was believed by many to be just such a wag-the-dog operation.
It is perhaps fitting that the work that gave birth to the tail wagging the dog is chiefly remembered for an event it is associated with rather than for itself.
Sources:
“About Tails.” Daily Picayune (New Orleans), 19 July 1872, 4.
“City Matters. Milwaukee Daily Sentinel (Wisconsin), 15 August 1863, 1. Gale Primary Sources: Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers.
The Free Press (Burlington, Vermont), 15 September 1866, 4. ProQuest Historical Newspapers.
Oxford English Dictionary, second edition, 1989, s.v. tail, n.1.
Taylor, Tom. Our American Cousin. 1869, 7–8. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Image Credit: Jefferson, Joseph. The Autobiography of Joseph Jefferson. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1889, 200–201. HathiTrust Digital Archive. Public domain image.