Mark Twain "Patriotism Is Supporting Your Country All the Time, Your Government When It Deserves It" 2 Sided Humorous Graphic Tee

Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced,"and "the father of American literature."  Twain was raised in Hannibal, Missouri, which later provided the setting for both Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. 

He served an apprenticeship with a printer early in his career, and then worked as a typesetter, contributing articles to his older brother Orion Clemens' newspaper. Twain then became a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River. Piloting also gave Twain his pen name from "mark twain," the leadsman's cry for a measured river depth of two fathoms (12 feet), which was safe water for a steamboat.

He wrote both fiction and non-fiction. As his fame grew, Twain became a much sought-after speaker. His wit and satire, both in prose and in speech, earned praise from critics and peers, and Twain was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty.

In "The Czar's Soliloquy," Twain advises those subject to the despotic Tsar Nicholas II, "Remember this, take it to heart, live by it, die for it if necessary: that our [Tsarist Russian] patriotism is medieval, outworn, obsolete; that the modern patriotism, the true patriotism, the only rational patriotism, is loyalty to the Nation all the time, loyalty to the Government when it deserves it." 

The front pocket features an American eagle above a cigar and tobacco leaves, a nod to Twain's love of cigars.

Twain was also a patriot and defender of American founding ideals who was not afraid to question the motivations of the political class.  Celebrate a great Ameican with the homage to the one and only Samuel Clemens!