THE McKINLEY-BRYAN CONTEST
1896
Cleveland and Harrison were cast in the same mould of statesmanship, differing only in degree, and they had some important qualities in common. Both stood for a better political system than was acceptable to their respective parties, and both regarded public duty as paramount to political or individual interests. They are the only two men of the nation each of whom retired from the Presidency defeated by the other. Both were vastly in advance of the dominant sentiment of their followers in the support of civil service reform. Neither of them was accomplished as a national politician. They never could have nominated themselves for President by political manipulation, nor could they have mastered the intricacies inevitable in the management of a great national contest. They employed none of the arts which have been common among public men to popularize themselves, and both were called to the leadership of their respective parties in Presidential battles because they were wanted rather than because they wanted the place. Both were regarded as unsympathetic by the ardent political leaders of their parties when it came to the distribution of administration patronage, and yet no two Presidents were ever more pronounced in their devotion to their party faith.
Cleveland was a Democrat all through from hat to boots; Harrison was equally positive as a Republican, and both held to the better teachings of their parties in the better days. Cleveland was a Jackson Democrat, Harrison a Lincoln Republican, and neither took to the modern political frills which sacrifice the substance of conviction to glittering shadows to protect political degeneracy. Cleveland was the more positive in purpose and bolder in action; Harrison was probably the stronger intellectual force, with greater aptness in adaptability to political movements, and both were thoroughly honest, tireless in devotion to duty, and sincerely patriotic. Both were exemplars of public and private purity, alike in home and trust, and the prattle of “Baby McKee” and of “Little Ruth” would at any time call either to forgetfulness of the honors and cares of State. Both finally retired from the Presidency, leaving records as Chief Magistrates which will ever shed rich lustre upon the annals of the Republic.
Cleveland’s second administration fell upon troublous times. The country was about to enter upon a severe season of industrial and business depression, that no political power nor the wisest legislation could have prevented. The products of our farms had reached the minimum of value. Debts were steadily increasing, labor was largely unemployed, and consumption of the necessaries of life was reduced to the lowest standard. The McKinley tariff of 1890 had given excessive protection to our industries, but that only stimulated production while it narrowed the markets for our products, and it was not surprising when silver reached the point that made a dollar worth only 50 cents, that the free silver theory should attract the hopeless debtor class by the promise of paying their obligations practically with one-half the money they had borrowed.
Both parties were severely honeycombed with the cheap-money theory, and although Cleveland had a Democratic Congress and was able, after the most exhaustive effort, to halt the continued purchase of silver for coinage, it was the last and only achievement he attained with the aid of Congress to better our financial system. It was most fortunate for the country that in this fearful peril to our national credit Grover Cleveland was President of the United States. He stood impregnable as the rock of Gibraltar when the fierce waves of repudiation surged against him from both parties, and when the West and South appeared to be practically unanimous in demanding cheap money, while even the more stable business and financial States of the North were greatly divided on the issue. Just as the peril to our national honor increased Cleveland’s determination and courage to maintain the right increased with it, and he finally braved a howling repudiation Congress by a demand for gold bonds to sustain Government credit with notice that, if refused by Congress, whereby a loss of many millions would be forced upon the country, he would sell bonds, as then authorized by law, to any extent necessary to maintain the most scrupulous faith of the nation.
Congress refused and Cleveland stood grandly alone with Congress against him, and saved the Republic from a stain of dishonor that would have been ineffaceable. This was a vastly more heroic act than Jackson’s throttling of nullification, as Jackson was sustained by the patriotic devotion to the Union. Another record of his administration that stands out among the heroic of Presidential actions was his promptness and courage in meeting the Chicago riots when the commerce of the nation was interrupted by lawlessness. In a single order issued by Cleveland directing public peace to be maintained and commerce permitted to go on uninterrupted by the strong arm of national power he effaced forever the last lingering dregs of States’ rights that would make a great Commonwealth the prey of the lawless with the National Government powerless to interfere. The Governor of Illinois was in hearty and open sympathy with the lawless, and refused the protection to public peace and to commerce that was his sworn duty to give, and the civil authorities of Chicago were the mere plaything of the mob.
These two acts of Grover Cleveland will go into history as among the most heroic and self-sacrificing acts of any of our long line of Presidents. Harrison would doubtless have met both of these emergencies as Cleveland did, but Cleveland had to brave the overwhelming prejudices of his own party to discharge the duty, while Harrison would have been heartily and unitedly sustained by his party in meeting the Chicago issue, and would have had the majority of his party followers in sympathy with him in maintaining the national credit. Cleveland retired from his second term of the Presidency with his party very generally alienated from him, and yet he had not in any material degree departed from the Democratic platform on which he was re-elected. He was not in any measure an apostate, but he stood resolutely where his party had planted him, while his party apostatized and became his bitterest foe.
No administration can command the support of the country when industry and trade are severely depressed. It matters not what may be the true cause of financial, commercial, and industrial revulsion; it is always charged to the policy of the party in power, and Cleveland could not escape political disaster because of conditions which he had no more part in producing than he had in creating the stars when they first sang together. The mid-administration elections of 1894 resulted in the most disastrous defeat the Democracy had ever suffered, and the cheap-money heresy rapidly grew in strength, disintegrating both the old parties until the question of maintaining national credit became one of the gravest ever presented to the people, with the single exception of the secession that caused our civil war.
The Wilson Tariff bill was passed with protective features sufficiently liberal to maintain our industries with the enlarged markets it would have produced for American products, but it was assailed as one of the chief causes of our industrial depression, and it became an important factor in the election of McKinley in 1896. It is now demonstrated before the close of the McKinley administration, that the protective features of the Wilson bill were more than equal to the necessities of the present. New and unexpected conditions brought this country suddenly to a policy of expansion in territory and trade, and to-day we have hardly an industry that really needs protection if it can have free markets for its products.
Cleveland was bitterly assailed as unfriendly to a liberal pension policy for our soldiers. He came into his second term in the midst of a tidal wave of pension profligacy. Private pensions were passed by the hundreds in Congress usually without debate, and often with only a small fraction of a quorum present. Cleveland vetoed a number of these bills, and I cannot recall one vetoed private pension bill that was passed over his veto, although there may have been a very few.
I happened to witness a painful exhibition of the cowardice of Congressmen in meeting the pension question after Cleveland had vetoed a bill greatly enlarging our pension system. On the morning of the day that the veto was to be taken in the House to sustain the veto or pass the bill, notwithstanding the objections of the President, I called upon Speaker Carlisle in his room in the Capitol, and there found him in earnest consultation with twelve or fifteen leading Democratic Congressmen. There was grave danger that the bill would pass over the veto, although certainly not one-third of the members of the House believed that the bill was just. The question discussed at that conference was who of the Democratic leaders could afford to take the floor in defence of the veto. All heartily approved of it, but only two of all those present expressed his willingness to come to the front and stand for the right. Governor Curtin, then a member of the House, had the courage to say that as the friend of the true soldier he would defend the veto on the floor, and while every one present agreed with him, a majority of them declared that it was a necessity, for their own safety at home, to vote for the bill. It was only by the greatest effort that the veto was sustained for want of a two-thirds vote, although a decided majority of the House voted for the bill.
Such were the conditions in which the people entered upon the memorable contest of 1896. Governor McKinley and Speaker Reed took the lead early in the race for the Republican nomination for President, and McKinley was most fortunate in having his Warwick in Mark A. Hanna, of Ohio, who conducted the McKinley battle on the same lines that Samuel J. Tilden conducted the contest for his nomination in 1876. His fight was won by well-organized and earnestly directed contests in every debatable State, and for a year or more before the convention met Hanna was tireless in his work. He had a strong candidate in McKinley; a man of blameless character, of admitted ability, a champion of protection, a soldier who had carried his musket as a private in the flame of battle, and possessing many attributes of personal popularity. Reed in his rough way fought his battle more heroically than wisely, and was finally unhorsed at the close of the contest by McKinley sweeping some of the New England States from him. That defeated Reed, and McKinley’s nomination was assured.
On only one point did Hanna seriously miscalculate the lines of safety. He saw the cheap-money and repudiation issue formidable on every side and in both parties, and he decided that McKinley should be nominated for President on a platform that straddled the money issue in a cowardly way. In order to give the cue to the party on the money issue, he called the Republican State Convention of Ohio to meet on the 11th of March, 1896, and that convention adopted the following money plank, intended to be the McKinley platform:
“We contend for honest money; for a currency of gold, silver, and paper with which to measure our exchanges, that shall be as sound as the Government and as untarnished as its honor, and to that end we favor bimetallism, and demand the use of both gold and silver as standard money, either in accordance with a ratio to be fixed by an international agreement, if that can be obtained, or under such restrictions and such provisions, to be determined by legislation, as will secure the maintenance of the parities of value of the two metals so that the purchasing and debt-paying power of the dollar, whether of silver, gold, or paper, shall be at all times equal.”
The Ohio money plank was generally accepted by the Republicans of the West as a cunning straddle, that would hold the cheap-money Republicans, whose devotion to protection made them willing to yield something on the money question, but it was severely criticised by a number of the ablest Republicans of the East, and before the convention met it became evident that the friends of an emphatic honest-money plank were likely to dominate the body.
The Republican National Convention met at St. Louis on the 16th of June. There was little or no dispute as to who would be nominated for President, as a decided majority of the delegates came there for the purpose of nominating McKinley. Charles W. Fairbanks, of Indiana, was temporary chairman and present Senator John M. Thurston, of Nebraska, permanent president. The struggle over the money plank of the platform kept the convention in idleness until the third day, when an agreement was reached in favor of the gold standard. There has been some dispute recently as to who made Hanna adopt the gold platform. There were many and very earnest consultations in St. Louis before an agreement with Hanna could be reached, and it was finally accomplished by a number of able members of the body deciding that they would notify Hanna, giving him one hour to accept the gold-standard platform, or they would carry it into the convention and compel McKinley’s friends to meet the issue in open debate. I was at the same hotel, on the same floor with Hanna, and knew just when that proposition was sent to him, and knew also that in little over half an hour he agreed to the demand of the gold-standard Republicans, and it was then adopted without a contest. When the platform was reported, Senator Teller, of Colorado, who led the Silver Republicans, and who was a member of the committee on resolutions, offered the following as a substitute for the money plank of the platform:
“The Republican party favors the use of both gold and silver as equal standard money, and pledges its power to secure the free, unrestricted, and independent coinage of gold and silver at our mints at the ratio of 16 parts of silver to 1 of gold.”
Senator Teller delivered an earnest and able argument in support of his substitute, but it was rejected by 818¹⁄₂ votes to 105¹⁄₂. A separate vote was also had on the financial plank as reported by the majority, and it was adopted by 812¹⁄₂ to 110¹⁄₂. When the platform was adopted, Senator Cannon, of Utah, presented a protest against the money plank of the platform, after which thirty-four delegates from the Western States, including Senators Teller and Cannon, withdrew from the convention. There was only one ballot for President, as follows:
| William McKinley, Ohio | 661 | ¹⁄₂ |
| Thomas B. Reed, Me. | 84 | ¹⁄₂ |
| Matthew S. Quay, Pa. | 61 | ¹⁄₂ |
| Levi P. Morton, N. Y. | 58 | |
| William B. Allison, Ia. | 35 | ¹⁄₂ |
| J. Donald Cameron, Pa. | 1 | |
| Blank | 4 |
The nomination of Garret A. Hobart, of New Jersey, for Vice-President was made on the 1st ballot by the following vote:
| Garret A. Hobart, N. J. | 535 | ¹⁄₂ |
| Henry Clay Evans, Tenn. | 277 | ¹⁄₂ |
| Morgan J. Bulkeley, Conn. | 39 | |
| James A. Walker, Va. | 24 | |
| Charles E. Lippitt, R. I. | 8 | |
| Thomas B. Reed, Maine | 3 | |
| Chauncey M. Depew, N. Y. | 3 | |
| John M. Thurston, Neb. | 2 | |
| Fred D. Grant, N. Y. | 2 | |
| Levi P. Morton, N. Y. | 1 |
The nominations of McKinley and Hobart were made unanimous with the wildest enthusiasm. The following is the Republican platform as adopted by the convention:
The Republicans of the United States, assembled by their representatives in national convention, appealing for the popular and historical justification of their claims to the matchless achievements of the thirty years of Republican rule, earnestly and confidently address themselves to the awakened intelligence, experience, and conscience of their countrymen in the following declaration of facts and principles:
For the first time since the Civil War the American people have witnessed the calamitous consequences of full and unrestricted Democratic control of the Government. It has been a record of unparalleled incapacity, dishonor, and disaster. In administrative management it has ruthlessly sacrificed indispensable revenue, entailed an unceasing deficit, eked out ordinary current expenses with borrowed money, piled up the public debt by $262,000,000 in time of peace, forced an adverse balance of trade, kept a perpetual menace hanging over the redemption fund, pawned American credit to alien syndicates, and reversed all the measures and results of successful Republican rule.
In the broad effect of its policy it has precipitated panic, blighted industry and trade with prolonged depression, closed factories, reduced work and wages, halted enterprise, and crippled American production while stimulating foreign production for the American market. Every consideration of public safety and individual interest demands that the Government shall be rescued from the hands of those who have shown themselves incapable of conducting it without disaster at home and dishonor abroad, and shall be restored to the party which for thirty years administered it with unequalled success and prosperity, and in this connection we heartily endorse the wisdom, the patriotism, and the success of the administration of President Harrison.
We renew and emphasize our allegiance to the policy of protection as the bulwark of American industrial independence and the foundation of American development and prosperity. This true American policy taxes foreign products and encourages home industry; it puts the burden of revenue on foreign goods; it secures the American market for the American producer; it upholds the American standard of wages for the American workingman; it puts the factory by the side of the farm, and makes the American farmer less dependent on foreign demand and price; it diffuses general thrift, and founds the strength of all on the strength of each. In its reasonable application it is just, fair, and impartial, equally opposed to foreign control and domestic monopoly, to sectional discrimination and individual favoritism.
We denounce the present Democratic tariff as sectional, injurious to the public credit, and destructive to business enterprise. We demand such an equitable tariff on foreign imports which come into competition with American products as will not only furnish adequate revenue for the necessary expenses of the Government, but will protect American labor from degradation to the wage level of other lands. We are not pledged to any particular schedules. The question of rates is a practical question, to be governed by the conditions of the time and of production; the ruling and uncompromising principle is the protection and development of American labor and industry. The country demands a right settlement, and then it wants rest.
We believe the repeal of the reciprocity arrangements negotiated by the last Republican administration was a national calamity, and we demand their renewal and extension on such terms as will equalize our trade with other nations, remove the restrictions which now obstruct the sale of American products in the ports of other countries, and secure enlarged markets for the products of our farms, forests, and factories.
Protection and reciprocity are twin measures of Republican policy, and go hand in hand. Democratic rule has recklessly struck down both, and both must be re-established. Protection for what we produce; free admission for the necessaries of life which we do not produce; reciprocity agreements of mutual interests which gain open markets for us in return for our open market to others. Protection builds up domestic industry and trade, and secures our own market for ourselves; reciprocity builds up foreign trade and finds an outlet for our surplus.
We condemn the present administration for not keeping faith with the sugar-producers of this country. The Republican party favors such protection as will lead to the production on American soil of all the sugar which the American people use, and for which they pay other countries more than $100,000,000 annually.
To all our products—to those of the mine and the fields, as well as those of the shop and factory; to hemp, to wool, the product of the great industry of sheep husbandry, as well as to the finished woollens of the mills—we promise the most ample protection.
We favor restoring the early American policy of discriminating duties for the upbuilding of our merchant marine and the protection of our shipping in the foreign carrying trade, so that American ships—the product of American labor, employed in American shipyards, sailing under the Stars and Stripes, and manned, officered, and owned by Americans—may regain the carrying of our foreign commerce.
The Republican party is unreservedly for sound money. It caused the enactment of the law providing for the resumption of specie payments in 1879; since then every dollar has been as good as gold.
We are unalterably opposed to every measure calculated to debase our currency or impair the credit of our country. We are, therefore, opposed to the free coinage of silver, except by international agreement with the leading commercial nations of the world, which we pledge ourselves to promote, and until such agreement can be obtained the existing gold standard must be preserved. All our silver and paper currency must be maintained at parity with gold, and we favor all measures designed to maintain inviolably the obligations of the United States and all our money, whether coin or paper, at the present standard, the standard of the most enlightened nations of the earth.
The veterans of the Union armies deserve and should receive fair treatment and generous recognition. Whenever practicable, they should be given the preference in the matter of employment, and they are entitled to the enactment of such laws as are best calculated to secure the fulfilment of the pledges made to them in the dark days of the country’s peril. We denounce the practice in the Pension Bureau, so recklessly and unjustly carried on by the present administration, of reducing pensions and arbitrarily dropping names from the rolls, as deserving the severest condemnation of the American people.
Our foreign policy should be at all times firm, vigorous, and dignified, and all our interests in the Western Hemisphere carefully watched and guarded. The Hawaiian Islands should be controlled by the United States, and no foreign power should be permitted to interfere with them; the Nicaragua Canal should be built, owned, and operated by the United States; and by the purchase of the Danish islands we should secure a proper and much-needed naval station in the West Indies.
The massacres in Armenia have aroused the deep sympathy and just indignation of the American people, and we believe that the United States should exercise all the influence it can properly exert to bring these atrocities to an end. In Turkey, American residents have been exposed to the gravest dangers and American property destroyed. There and everywhere American citizens and American property must be absolutely protected at all hazards and at any cost.
We reassert the Monroe Doctrine in its full extent, and we re-affirm the right of the United States to give the doctrine effect by responding to the appeal of any American State for friendly intervention in case of European encroachment. We have not interfered and shall not interfere with the existing possessions of any European power in this hemisphere, but those possessions must not on any pretext be extended. We hopefully look forward to the eventual withdrawal of the European powers from this hemisphere, and to the ultimate union of all English-speaking parts of the continent by the free consent of its inhabitants.
From the hour of achieving their own independence, the people of the United States have regarded with sympathy the struggles of other American people to free themselves from European domination. We watch with deep and abiding interest the heroic battle of the Cuban patriots against cruelty and oppression, and our best hopes go out for the full success of their determined contest for liberty.
The Government of Spain, having lost control of Cuba, and being unable to protect the property or lives of resident American citizens, or to comply with its treaty obligations, we believe that the Government of the United States should actively use its influence and good offices to restore peace and give independence to the island.
The peace and security of the Republic and the maintenance of its rightful influence among the nations of the earth demand a naval power commensurate with its position and responsibility. We therefore favor the continued enlargement of the navy and a complete system of harbor and seacoast defences.
For the protection of the quality of our American citizenship and of the wages of our workingmen against the fatal competition of low-priced labor, we demand that the immigration laws be thoroughly enforced, and so extended as to exclude from entrance to the United States those who can neither read nor write.
The civil service law was placed on the statute book by the Republican party, which has always sustained it, and we renew our repeated declarations that it shall be thoroughly and honestly enforced and extended wherever practicable.
We demand that every citizen of the United States shall be allowed to cast one free and unrestricted ballot, and that such ballot shall be counted and returned as cast.
We proclaim our unqualified condemnation of the uncivilized and barbarous practice, well known as lynching, or killing of human beings suspected or charged with crime, without process of law.
We favor the creation of a national Board of Arbitration to settle and adjust differences which may arise between employers and employés engaged in interstate commerce.
We believe in an immediate return to the free-homestead policy of the Republican party, and urge the passage by Congress of a satisfactory free-homestead measure such as has already passed the House, and is now pending in the Senate.
We favor the admission of the remaining Territories at the earliest practicable date, having due regard to the interests of the people of the Territories and of the United States. All the Federal officers appointed for the Territories should be selected from bona fide residents thereof, and the right of self-government should be accorded as far as practicable.
We believe the citizens of Alaska should have representation in the Congress of the United States, to the end that needful legislation may be intelligently enacted.
We sympathise with all wise and legitimate efforts to lessen and prevent the evils of intemperance and promote morality.
The Republican party is mindful of the rights and interests of women. Protection of American industries includes equal opportunities, equal pay for equal work, and protection to the home. We favor the admission of women to wider spheres of usefulness, and welcome their co-operation in rescuing the country from Democratic and Populist mismanagement and misrule.
Such are the principles and policies of the Republican party. By these principles we will abide and these policies we will put into execution. We ask for them the considerate judgment of the American people. Confident alike in the history of our great party and in the justice of our cause, we present our platform and our candidates in the full assurance that the election will bring victory to the Republican party and prosperity to the people of the United States.
The Democratic National Convention met at Chicago on the 7th of July, and the emphatic deliverance of the Republican convention in favor of the gold standard greatly strengthened the free-silver Democratic element, but the sound-money Democrats had control of the national committee, with William F. Harrity, chairman, whose duty it was to call the convention to order. Earnest efforts were made to harmonize the party in the organization, but the Free Silverites were aggressive from the start, and when the national committee named Senator Hill, of New York, as temporary chairman, a bitter debate was precipitated, and Senator Daniel, of Virginia, an out-and-out Free Silverite, was elected by 556 to 349. On the second day the report of the committee on credentials strengthened the free-silver wing by the admission of the Bryan delegation from Nebraska, and four sound-money Democrats were rejected from Michigan, and their places given to free-silver delegates. Senator White, of California, was made permanent president. The platform was adopted, as is usual, before the nomination for President, and it was in the protracted and intensely bitter debate of the money question that brought out the eloquent and dramatic address of William J. Bryan, that carried him into the Democratic nomination with a tidal wave.
A sound financial plank was offered by the minority, but rejected by 626 to 303. Another resolution, declaring, “We commend the honesty, economy, courage, and fidelity of the present Democratic (Cleveland) administration,” was greeted with a yell of derision and rejected by 564 to 357. Senator Hill offered two amendments to temper the repudiation plank, but they were rejected without a division. The platform was then adopted by 628 to 301. The sound-money Democrats found themselves in a helpless and hopeless minority. Many of them desired to withdraw from the convention, but the more considerate refused to do so, and all of them remained, 178 of them refusing to vote on the 1st ballot for President. Chairman Harrity, of the national committee, with his delegation participated in all the ballots and steadily voted for ex-Governor Pattison. Five ballots were had for President, with Bryan starting at 119 to 235 for Bland, of Missouri, who was the father of the silver dollar, and should have been accepted as the logical candidate of the free-silver party, but Bryan’s “crown of thorns” had captured the convention, and he won an easy victory. The following table gives the five ballots for President in detail:
| First. | Second. | Third. | Fourth. | Fifth. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Whole number of votes | 752 | 768 | 768 | 769 | 768 |
| Necessary for a choice (two-thirds) | 502 | 512 | 512 | 513 | 512 |
| William J. Bryan, Nebraska | 119 | 190 | 219 | 280 | 500 |
| Richard P. Bland, Missouri | 235 | 283 | 291 | 241 | 106 |
| Robert E. Pattison, Pennsylvania | 95 | 100 | 97 | 97 | 95 |
| Horace Boies, Iowa | 85 | 41 | 36 | 33 | 26 |
| Joseph S. C. Blackburn, Kentucky | 83 | 41 | 27 | 27 | — |
| John R. McLean, Ohio | 54 | 53 | 54 | 46 | — |
| Claude Matthews, Indiana | 37 | 33 | 34 | 36 | 31 |
| Benjamin R. Tillman, South Carolina | 17 | — | — | — | — |
| Sylvester Pennoyer, Oregon | 8 | 8 | — | — | — |
| Henry M. Teller, Colorado | 8 | 8 | — | — | — |
| Adlai E. Stevenson, Illinois | 7 | 10 | 9 | 8 | 8 |
| William E. Russell, Massachusetts | 2 | — | — | — | — |
| James E. Campbell, Ohio | 1 | — | — | — | — |
| David B. Hill, New York | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| David Turpie, Indiana | — | — | — | — | 1 |
| Not voting | 178 | 162 | 162 | 162 | 162 |
On the 5th ballot Bryan was only 12 votes short of the necessary two-thirds, and immediately after the roll-call was completed, and before the vote had been given, 78 delegates changed their votes from other candidates to Bryan, giving him the nomination. The convention received the result with the wildest cheers for Bryan, mingled with some hisses and general sullen silence among the sound-money Democrats.
There was a spirited contest for the Vice-Presidency, in which John R. McLean, of Ohio, was well to the front, and led all others on the 4th ballot, but on the 5th a whirl was made to Sewall, of Maine, giving him the nomination. The following table gives the ballot in detail:
| First. | Second. | Third. | Fourth. | Fifth. | |
| Whole number of votes | 670 | 675 | 675 | 677 | 679 |
| Necessary for a choice (two-thirds) | 447 | 450 | 450 | 452 | 453 |
| Arthur Sewall, Maine | 100 | 37 | 97 | 261 | 568 |
| Joseph C. Sibley, Pennsylvania | 163 | 113 | 50 | — | — |
| John R. McLean, Ohio | 111 | 158 | 210 | 296 | 32 |
| George F. Williams, Massachusetts | 76 | 16 | 15 | 9 | 9 |
| Richard P. Bland, Missouri | 62 | 294 | 255 | — | — |
| Walter A. Clark, North Carolina | 50 | 22 | 22 | 46 | 22 |
| John R. Williams, Illinois | 22 | 13 | — | — | — |
| William F. Harrity, Pennsylvania | 21 | 21 | 19 | 11 | 11 |
| Horace Boies, Iowa | 20 | — | — | — | — |
| Joseph S. C. Blackburn, Kentucky | 20 | — | — | — | — |
| John W. Daniel, Virginia | 11 | 1 | 6 | 54 | 36 |
| James H. Lewis, Washington | 11 | — | — | — | — |
| Robert E. Pattison, Pennsylvania | — | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Henry M. Teller, Colorado | 1 | — | — | — | — |
| Stephen M. White, California | 1 | — | — | — | — |
| George W. Fithian, Illinois | 1 | — | — | — | — |
| Not voting | 260 | 255 | 255 | 253 | 251 |
The following is the full text of the Democratic platform:
We, the Democrats of the United States, in national convention assembled, do reaffirm our allegiance to those great essential principles of justice and liberty, upon which our institutions are founded, and which the Democratic party has advocated from Jefferson’s time to our own—freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of conscience, the preservation of personal rights, the equality of all citizens before the law, and the faithful observance of constitutional limitations.
During all these years the Democratic party has resisted the tendency of selfish interests to the centralization of governmental power, and steadfastly maintained the integrity of the dual scheme of government established by the founders of this republic of republics. Under its guidance and teachings, the great principle of local self-government has found its best expression in the maintenance of the rights of the States, and in its assertion of the necessity of confining the General Government to the exercise of the powers granted by the Constitution of the United States.
The Constitution of the United States guarantees to every citizen the rights of civil and religious liberty. The Democratic party has always been the exponent of political liberty and religious freedom, and it renews its obligations and reaffirms its devotion to these fundamental principles of the Constitution.
Recognizing that the money question is paramount to all others at this time, we invite attention to the fact that the Federal Constitution names silver and gold together as the money metals of the United States, and that the first coinage law passed by Congress under the Constitution made the silver dollar the money unit, and admitted gold to free coinage at a ratio based upon the silver dollar unit.
We declare that the act of 1873 demonetizing silver without the knowledge or approval of the American people has resulted in the appreciation of gold and a corresponding fall in the prices of commodities produced by the people; a heavy increase in the burden of taxation and of all debts, public and private; the enrichment of the money-lending class at home and abroad; the prostration of industry and impoverishment of the people.
We are unalterably opposed to monometallism, which has locked fast the prosperity of an industrial people in the paralysis of hard times. Gold monometallism is a British policy, and its adoption has brought other nations into financial servitude to London. It is not only un-American, but anti-American, and it can be fastened on the United States only by the stifling of that spirit and love of liberty which proclaimed our political independence in 1776 and won it in the war of the Revolution.
We demand the free and unlimited coinage of both silver and gold at the present legal ratio of sixteen to one without waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation. We demand that the standard silver dollar shall be a full legal tender, equally with gold, for all debts, public and private, and we favor such legislation as will prevent for the future the demonetization of any kind of legal tender money by private contract.
We are opposed to the policy and practice of surrendering to the holders of the obligations of the United States the option reserved by law to the Government of redeeming such obligations in either silver coin or gold coin.
We are opposed to the issuing of interest-bearing bonds of the United States in time of peace, and condemn the trafficking with banking syndicates, which, in exchange for bonds and at enormous profit to themselves, supply the Federal Treasury with gold to maintain the policy of gold monometallism.
Congress alone has the power to coin and issue money, and President Jackson declared that this power could not be delegated to corporations or individuals. We therefore denounce the issuance of notes intended to circulate as money by national banks as in derogation of the Constitution, and we demand that all paper which is made a legal tender for public and private debts, or which is receivable for duties to the United States, shall be issued by the Government of the United States and shall be redeemable in coin.
We hold that tariff duties should be levied for purposes of revenue, such duties to be so adjusted as to operate equally throughout the country, and not discriminate between class or section, and that taxation should be limited by the needs of the Government honestly and economically administered.
We denounce as disturbing to business the Republican threat to restore the McKinley law, which has twice been condemned by the people in national elections, and which, enacted under the false plea of protection to home industry, proved a prolific breeder of trusts and monopolies, enriched the few at the expense of the many, restricted trade, and deprived the producers of the great American staples of access to their natural markets.
Until the money question is settled we are opposed to any agitation for further changes in our tariff laws, except such as are necessary to meet the deficit in revenue caused by the adverse decision of the Supreme Court on the income tax. But for this decision by the Supreme Court, there would be no deficit in the revenue under the law passed by a Democratic Congress in strict pursuance of the uniform decisions of that court for nearly one hundred years, that court having in that decision sustained constitutional objections to its enactment which had previously been overruled by the ablest judges who have ever sat on that bench. We declare that it is the duty of Congress to use all the constitutional power which remains after that decision, or which may come from its reversal by the court as it may hereafter be constituted, so that the burdens of taxation may be equally and impartially laid, to the end that wealth may bear its due proportion of the expenses of the Government.
We hold that the most efficient way of protecting American labor is to prevent the importation of foreign pauper labor to compete with it in the home market, and that the value of the home market to our American farmers and artisans is greatly reduced by a vicious monetary system which depresses the prices of their products below the cost of production, and thus deprives them of the means of purchasing the products of our home manufactories; and, as labor creates the wealth of the country, we demand the passage of such laws as may be necessary to protect it in all its rights.
We are in favor of the arbitration of differences between employers engaged in interstate commerce and their employés, and recommend such legislation as is necessary to carry out this principle.
The absorption of wealth by the few, the consolidation of our leading railroad systems, and the formation of trusts and pools require a stricter control by the Federal Government of those arteries of commerce. We demand the enlargement of the powers of the interstate commerce commission, and such restrictions and guarantees in the control of railroads as will protect the people from robbery and oppression.
We denounce the profligate waste of the money wrung from the people by oppressive taxation and the lavish appropriations of recent Republican Congresses, which have kept taxes high, while the labor that pays them is unemployed and the products of the people’s toil are depressed in price till they no longer repay the cost of production. We demand a return to that simplicity and economy which befits a democratic government and a reduction in the number of useless offices, the salaries of which drain the substance of the people.
We denounce arbitrary interference by Federal authorities in local affairs as a violation of the Constitution of the United States and a crime against free institutions, and we especially object to government by injunction as a new and highly dangerous form of oppression by which Federal judges, in contempt of the laws of the States and rights of citizens, become at once legislators, judges, and executioners; and we approve the bill passed at the last session of the United States Senate, and now pending in the House of Representatives, relative to contempts in Federal courts and providing for trials by jury in certain cases of contempt.
No discrimination should be indulged in by the Government of the United States in favor of any of its debtors. We approve of the refusal of the Fifty-third Congress to pass the Pacific Railroad Funding bill, and denounce the effort of the present Republican Congress to enact a similar measure.
Recognizing the just claims of deserving Union soldiers, we heartily endorse the rule of the present Commissioner of Pensions, that no name shall be arbitrarily dropped from the pension roll; and the fact of enlistment and service should be deemed conclusive evidence against disease and disability before enlistment.
We favor the admission of the Territories of New Mexico, Arizona, and Oklahoma into the Union as States, and we favor the early admission of all the Territories having the necessary population and resources to entitle them to statehood, and, while they remain Territories, we hold that the officials appointed to administer the government of any Territory, together with the District of Columbia and Alaska, should be bonâ fide residents of the Territory or district in which the duties are to be performed. The Democratic party believes in home rule, and that all public lands of the United States should be appropriated to the establishment of free homes for American citizens.
We recommend that the Territory of Alaska be granted a delegate in Congress, and that the general land and timber laws of the United States be extended to said Territory.
The Monroe Doctrine, as originally declared and as interpreted by succeeding Presidents, is a permanent part of the foreign policy of the United States, and must at all times be maintained.
We extend our sympathy to the people of Cuba in their heroic struggle for liberty and independence.
We are opposed to life tenure in the public service, except as provided in the Constitution. We favor appointments based upon merit, fixed terms of office, and such an administration of the civil service laws as will afford equal opportunities to all citizens of ascertained fitness.
We declare it to be the unwritten law of this Republic, established by custom and usage of a hundred years, and sanctioned by the examples of the greatest and wisest of those who founded and have maintained our Government, that no man should be eligible for a third term of the Presidential office.
The Federal Government should care for and improve the Mississippi River and other great waterways of the Republic, so as to secure for the interior States easy and cheap transportation to tidewater. When any waterway of the Republic is of sufficient importance to demand aid of the Government, such aid should be extended upon a definite plan of continuous work until permanent improvement is secured.
Confiding in the justice of our cause and the necessity of its success at the polls, we submit the foregoing declaration of principles and purposes to the considerate judgment of the American people. We invite the support of all citizens who approve them, and who desire to have them made effective, through legislation, for the relief of the people and the restoration of the country’s prosperity.
A minority of the Committee on Resolutions, consisting of the members from sixteen States, submitted a dissenting report, expressing their inability to give their assent to “many declarations” of the platform. “Some are ill-considered and ambiguously phrased, while others are extreme and revolutionary of the well-recognized principles of the party.” They offered two amendments, the first a substitute for the financial plank, as follows:
We declare our belief that the experiment on the part of the United States alone of free silver coinage and a change in the existing standard of value, independently of the action of other great nations, would not only imperil our finances, but would retard, or entirely prevent, the establishment of international bimetallism, to which the efforts of the Government should be steadily directed.
It would place this country at once upon a silver basis, impair contracts, disturb business, diminish the purchasing power of the wages of labor, and inflict irreparable evils upon our nation’s commerce and industry.
Until international co-operation among leading nations for the coinage of silver can be secured, we favor the rigid maintenance of the existing gold standard as essential to the preservation of our national credit, the redemption of our public pledges, and the keeping inviolate of our country’s honor.
We insist that all our paper currency shall be kept at a parity with gold. The Democratic party is the party of hard money, and is opposed to legal tender paper money as a part of our permanent financial system, and we therefore favor the gradual retirement and cancellation of all United States notes and treasury notes, under such legislative provisions as will prevent undue contraction.
We demand that the national credit shall be resolutely maintained at all times and under all circumstances.
The People’s party, then better known as the Populists, and the Free Silver party, held their conventions at St. Louis on the 22d of July. The cheap-money elements were divided into two extreme factions, with a third that was known as the “Middle-of-the-Road” men. The Populist convention was presided over by Senator Butler, of North Carolina, as temporary chairman, and Senator Allen, of Nebraska, as permanent president, and the question of acting with the Democratic party in support of the Chicago platform and candidate for President, was settled by the preliminary motion to proceed to the nomination of a candidate for Vice-President. It was adopted by 785 to 615. That meant the nomination of Bryan, but the rejection of Sewall. A single ballot was had for Vice-President, resulting as follows:
| Thomas E. Watson, Ga. | 539 | ³⁄₄ |
| Arthur Sewall, Maine | 257 | ¹⁄₈ |
| Frank Burkett, Miss. | 190 | ³⁄₄ |
| Harry Skinner, N. C. | 142 | ¹⁄₄ |
| A. L. Mims, Tenn. | 118 | ⁵⁄₁₆ |
| Mann Page, Virginia | 89 | ⁵⁄₁₆ |
Watson lacked over 100 of the majority, but a sufficient number of delegates promptly changed their votes to make him the nominee. After nominating the candidate for Vice-President, the convention proceeded to ballot for President, as follows:
| William J. Bryan, Neb. | 1,042 |
| S. F. Norton, Ill. | 321 |
| Eugene B. Debs, Ind. | 8 |
| Ignatius Donnelly, Minn. | 3 |
| J. S. Coxey, Ohio | 1 |
The following platform was adopted after three minority reports had been rejected:
The People’s party, assembled in national convention, reaffirms its allegiance to the principles declared by the founders of the Republic, and also to the fundamental principles of just government as enunciated in the platform of the party in 1892.
We recognize that through the connivance of the present and preceding administrations the country has reached a crisis in its national life as predicted in our declaration four years ago, and that prompt and patriotic action is the supreme duty of the hour. We realize that while we have political independence our financial and industrial independence is yet to be attained by restoring to our country the constitutional control and exercise of the functions necessary to a people’s government, which functions have been basely surrendered by our public servants to corporate monopolies. The influence of European money-changers has been more potent in shaping legislation than the voice of the American people. Executive power and patronage have been used to corrupt our Legislatures and defeat the will of the people, and plutocracy has been enthroned upon the ruins of democracy. To restore the Government intended by the fathers and for the welfare and prosperity of this and future generations, we demand the establishment of an economic and financial system which shall make us masters of our own affairs, and independent of European control, by the adoption of the following declaration of principles:
1. We demand a national money, safe and sound, issued by the General Government only, without the intervention of banks of issue, to be a full legal tender for all debts, public and private; a just, equitable, and efficient means of distribution direct to the people and through the lawful disbursements of the Government.
2. We demand the free and unrestricted coinage of silver and gold at the present legal ratio of sixteen to one, without waiting for the consent of foreign nations.
3. We demand that the volume of circulating medium be speedily increased to an amount sufficient to meet the demands of business and population and to restore the just level of prices of labor and production.
4. We denounce the sale of bonds and the increase of the interest-bearing debt made by the present administration as unnecessary and without authority of law, and demand that no more bonds be issued except by specific act of Congress.
5. We demand such legislation as will prevent the demonetization of the lawful money of the United States by private contract.
6. We demand that the Government, in payment of its obligations, shall use its option as to the kind of lawful money in which they are to be paid, and we denounce the present and preceding administrations for surrendering this option to the holders of Government obligations.
7. We demand a graduated income tax, to the end that aggregated wealth shall bear its just proportion of taxation; and we regard the recent decision of the Supreme Court relative to the income tax law as a misinterpretation of the Constitution, and an invasion of the rightful powers of Congress over the subject of taxation.
8. We demand that postal savings banks be established by the Government for the safe deposit of the savings of the people and to facilitate exchange.
9. Transportation being a means of exchange and a public necessity, Government should own and operate the railroads in the interests of the people and on a non-partisan basis, to the end that all may be accorded the same treatment in transportation, and that the tyranny and political power now exercised by the great railroad corporations, which result in the impairment, if not the destruction, of the political rights and personal liberties of the citizen, may be destroyed. Such ownership is to be accomplished gradually, in a manner consistent with sound public policy.
10. The interest of the United States in the public highways, built with public moneys, and the proceeds of extensive grants of land to the Pacific railroads should never be alienated, mortgaged, or sold, but guarded and protected for the general welfare as provided by the laws organizing such railroads. The foreclosure of existing liens of the United States on these roads should at once follow default in the payment thereof by the debtor-companies; and at the foreclosure sales of said roads the Government shall purchase the same if it become necessary to protect its interests therein, or if they can be purchased at a reasonable price; and the Government shall operate said railroads as public highways for the benefit of the whole people, and not in the interest of the few, under suitable provisions for protection of life and property, giving to all transportation interests equal privileges and equal rates for fares and freight.
11. We denounce the present infamous schemes for refunding these debts, and demand that the laws now applicable thereto be executed and administered according to their true intent and spirit.
12. The telegraph, like the post-office system, being a necessity for the transmission of news, should be owned and operated by the Government in the interest of the people.
13. The true policy demands that national and State legislation shall be such as will ultimately enable every prudent and industrious citizen to secure a home, and therefore the lands should not be monopolized for speculative purposes. All lands now held by railroads and other corporations in excess of their actual needs should by lawful means be reclaimed by the Government and held for actual settlers only, and subject to the right of every human being to acquire a home upon the soil, and private land monopoly, as well as alien ownership, should be prohibited.
14. We condemn the frauds by which the land grants to the Pacific Railroad companies have, through the connivance of the Interior Department, robbed multitudes of actual bonâ fide settlers of their homes and miners of their claims, and we demand legislation by Congress which will enforce the exemption of mineral land from such grants after as well as before the patent.
15. We demand that bonâ fide settlers on all public lands be granted free homes as provided in the National Homestead law, and that no exception be made in the case of Indian reservations when opened for settlement, and that all lands not now patented come under this demand.
We favor a system of direct legislation through the initiative and referendum under proper constitutional safeguards.
1. We demand the election of President, Vice-President, and United States Senators by a direct vote of the people.
2. We tender to the patriotic people of Cuba our deepest sympathy in their heroic struggle for political freedom and independence, and we believe the time has come when the United States, the great Republic of the world, should recognize that Cuba is and of right out to be a free and independent State.
3. We favor home rule in the Territories and the District of Columbia, and the early admission of Territories as States.
4. All public salaries should be made to correspond to the price of labor and its products.
5. In times of great industrial depression, idle labor should be employed on public works as far as practicable.
6. The arbitrary course of the courts in assuming to imprison citizens for indirect contempt, and ruling by injunction, should be prevented by proper legislation.
7. We favor just pensions for our disabled Union soldiers.
8. Believing that the elective franchise and an untrammelled ballot are essential to a government of, for, and by the people, the People’s party condemn the wholesale system of disfranchisement adopted in some of the States as unrepublican and undemocratic, and we declare it to be the duty of the several State Legislatures to take such action as will secure a full, free, and fair ballot and an honest count.
9. While the foregoing propositions constitute the platform upon which our party stands, and for the vindication of which its organization will be maintained, we recognize that the great and pressing issue of the present campaign upon which the present Presidential election will turn is the financial question, and upon this great and specific issue between the parties we cordially invite the aid and co-operation of all organizations and citizens agreeing with us upon this vital question.
The National Silver party held its convention at the same time and place, with Frank G. Newlands, of Nevada, as temporary chairman, and William P. St. John, of New York, as permanent president. No time during the proceedings of the convention was a vote had to indicate the number of delegates. William J. Bryan, of Nebraska, was nominated for President, and Arthur Sewall, of Maine, for Vice-President, both by acclamation. The following platform was adopted:
The National Silver party of America, in convention assembled, hereby adopts the following declaration of principles:
First, the paramount issue at this time in the United States is indisputably the money question. It is between the British gold standard, gold bonds, and bank currency on the one side, and the bimetallic standard, no bonds, Government currency, and an American policy on the other.
On this issue we declare ourselves to be in favor of a distinctive American financial system. We are unalterably opposed to the single gold standard, and demand the immediate return to the constitutional standard of gold and silver, by the restoration by this Government, independently of any foreign power, of the unrestricted coinage of both gold and silver into standard money, at the ratio of sixteen to one, and upon terms of exact equality, as they existed prior to 1873; the silver coin to be of full legal tender, equally with gold, for all debts and dues, public and private; and we demand such legislation as will prevent for the future the destruction of the legal tender quality of any kind of money by private contract.
We hold that the power to control and regulate a paper currency is inseparable from the power to coin money, and hence that all currency intended to circulate as money should be issued, and its volume controlled, by the General Government only, and should be a legal tender.
We are unalterably opposed to the issue by the United States of interest-bearing bonds in time of peace, and we denounce as a blunder worse than a crime the present treasury policy, concurred in by a Republican House of Representatives, of plunging the country into debt by hundreds of millions in the vain attempt to maintain the gold standard by borrowing gold; and we demand the payment of all coin obligations of the United States as provided by existing laws, in either gold or silver coin, at the option of the Government, and not at the option of the creditor.
The demonetization of silver in 1873 enormously increased the demand for gold, enhancing its purchasing power and lowering all prices measured by that standard; and, since that unjust and indefensible act, the prices of American products have fallen, upon an average, nearly fifty per cent., carrying down with them proportionately the money value of all other forms of property.
Such fall of prices has destroyed the profits of legitimate industry, injuring the producer for the benefit of the non-producer; increasing the burden of the debtor, swelling the gains of the creditor, paralyzing the productive energies of the American people, relegating to idleness vast numbers of willing workers, sending the shadows of despair into the home of the honest toiler, filling the land with tramps and paupers, and building up colossal fortunes at the money centres.
In the effort to maintain the gold standard, the country has, within the last two years, in a time of profound peace and plenty, been loaded down with $262,000,000 of additional interest-bearing debt under such circumstances as to allow a syndicate of native and foreign bankers to realize a net profit of millions on a single deal.
It stands confessed that the gold standard can be only upheld by so depleting our paper currency as to force the prices of our products below the European, and even below the Asiatic, level to enable us to sell in foreign markets, thus aggravating the very evils of which our people so bitterly complain, degrading American labor and striking at the foundations of our civilization itself.
The advocates of the gold standard persistently claim that the real cause of our distress is overproduction—that we have produced so much that it made us poor—which implies that the true remedy is to close the factory, abandon the farm, and throw a multitude of people out of employment—a doctrine that leaves us unnerved and disheartened, and absolutely without hope for the future.
We affirm it to be unquestioned that there can be no such economic paradox as overproduction, and at the same time tens of thousands of our fellow-citizens remaining half clothed and half fed, and piteously clamoring for the common necessities of life.
Over and above all other questions of policy, we are in favor of restoring to the people of the United States the time-honored money of the Constitution—gold and silver, not one, but both—the money of Washington and Hamilton and Jefferson and Monroe and Jackson and Lincoln, to the end that the American people may receive honest pay for an honest product; that the American debtor may pay his just obligations in an honest standard, and not in a dishonest and unsound standard, appreciated one hundred per cent. in purchasing power, and no appreciation in debt-paying power; and to the end, further, that silver standard countries may be deprived of the unjust advantage they now enjoy, in the difference in exchange between gold and silver, an advantage which tariff legislation cannot overcome.
We, therefore, confidently appeal to the people of the United States to hold in abeyance all other questions, however important and even momentous they may appear, to sunder, if need be, all former party ties and affiliations, and unite in one supreme effort to free themselves and their children from the domination of the money power—a power more destructive than any which has ever been fastened upon the civilized men of any race or in any age. And upon the consummation of our desires and efforts we invoke the aid of all patriotic American citizens, and the gracious favor of Divine Providence.
The sound-money Democrats of the country called a national convention that met at Indianapolis on the 2d of September, and adopted the title of the National Democratic party. Governor Flower, of New York, was temporary chairman, and Senator Caffery, of Louisiana, was permanent president. General John M. Palmer, of Illinois, was nominated for President on the 1st ballot, receiving 769¹⁄₂ votes to 118¹⁄₂ votes for General Edward S. Bragg, of Wisconsin. General Simon B. Buckner, of Kentucky, was nominated for Vice-President by acclamation. The following platform was unanimously adopted:
This convention has assembled to uphold the principles on which depend the honor and welfare of the American people, in order that Democrats throughout the Union may unite their patriotic efforts to avert disaster from their country and ruin from their party.
The Democratic party is pledged to equal and exact justice to all men, of every creed and condition; to the largest freedom of the individual consistent with good government; to the preservation of the Federal Government in its constitutional vigor, and to the support of the States in all their just rights; to economy in the public expenditures; to the maintenance of the public faith and sound money; and it is opposed to paternalism and all class legislation.
The declarations of the Chicago convention attack individual freedom, the right of private contract, the independence of the judiciary, and the authority of the President to enforce Federal laws. They advocate a reckless attempt to increase the price of silver by legislation, to the debasement of our monetary standard, and threaten unlimited issues of paper money by the Government. They abandon for Republican allies the Democratic cause of tariff reform, to court the favor of protectionists to their fiscal heresy.
In view of these and other grave departures from Democratic principles, we cannot support the candidates of that convention nor be bound by its acts.
The Democratic party has survived defeats, but could not survive a victory won in behalf of the doctrine and policy proclaimed in its name at Chicago.
The conditions, however, which make possible such utterances from a national convention are the direct result of class legislation by the Republican party. It still proclaims, as it has for years, the power and duty of Government to raise and maintain prices by law, and it proposes no remedy for existing evils, except oppressive and unjust taxation.
The National Democracy here convened therefore renews its declaration of faith in Democratic principles, especially as applicable to the conditions of the times. Taxation—tariff, excise, or direct—is rightfully imposed only for public purposes, and not for private gain. Its amount is justly measured by public expenditures, which should be limited by scrupulous economy. The sum derived by the Treasury from tariff and excise levies is affected by the state of trade and volume of consumption. The amount required by the Treasury is determined by the appropriations made by Congress. The demand of the Republican party for an increase in tariff taxation has its pretext in the deficiency of revenue, which has its causes in the stagnation of trade and reduced consumption, due entirely to the loss of confidence that has followed the Populist threat of free coinage and depreciation of our money, and the Republican practice of extravagant appropriations beyond the needs of good government.
We arraign and condemn the Populist conventions of Chicago and St. Louis for their co-operation with the Republican party in creating these conditions, which are pleaded in justification of a heavy increase of the burdens of the people by a further resort to protection. We therefore denounce protection and its ally, free coinage of silver, as schemes for the personal profit of a few at the expense of the masses, and oppose the two parties which stand for these schemes as hostile to the people of the Republic, whose food and shelter, comfort and prosperity, are attacked by higher taxes and depreciated money. In fine, we reaffirm the historic Democratic doctrine of tariff for revenue only.
We demand that henceforth modern and liberal policies toward American shipping shall take the place of our imitation of the restricted statutes of the eighteenth century, which were long ago abandoned by every maritime power but the United States, and which, to the nation’s humiliation, have driven American capital and enterprise to the use of alien flags and alien crews, have made the Stars and Stripes almost an unknown emblem in foreign ports, and have virtually extinguished the race of American seamen. We oppose the pretence that discriminating duties will promote shipping; that scheme is an invitation to commercial warfare upon the United States, un-American in the light of our great commercial treaties, offering no gain whatever to American shipping, while greatly increasing ocean freights on our agricultural and manufactured products.
The experience of mankind has shown that, by reason of their natural qualities, gold is the necessary money of the large affairs of commerce and business, while silver is conveniently adapted to minor transactions, and the most beneficial use of both together can be insured only by the adoption of the former as a standard of monetary measure, and the maintenance of silver at a parity with gold by its limited coinage under suitable safeguards of law. Thus the largest possible enjoyment of both metals is gained with a value universally accepted throughout the world, which constitutes the only practical bimetallic currency, assuring the most stable standard, and especially the best and safest money for all who earn their livelihood by labor or the produce of husbandry. They cannot suffer when paid in the best money known to man, but are the peculiar and most defenceless victims of a debased and fluctuating currency, which offers continual profits to the money-changer at their cost.
Realizing these truths, demonstrated by long and public inconvenience and loss, the Democratic party, in the interests of the masses and of equal justice to all, practically established by the legislation of 1834 and 1853 the gold standard of monetary measurement, and likewise entirely divorced the Government from banking and currency issues. To this long-established Democratic policy we adhere, and insist upon the maintenance of the gold standard, and of the parity therewith of every dollar issued by the Government, and are firmly opposed to the free and unlimited coinage of silver and to the compulsory purchase of silver bullion. But we denounce also the further maintenance of the present costly patchwork system of national paper currency as a constant source of injury and peril. We assert the necessity of such intelligent currency reform as will confine the Government to its legitimate functions, completely separated from the banking business, and afford to all sections of our country uniform, safe, and elastic bank currency under governmental supervision, measured in volume by the needs of business.
The fidelity, patriotism, and courage with which President Cleveland has fulfilled his great public trust, the high character of his administration, its wisdom and energy in the maintenance of civil order and the enforcement of the laws, its equal regard for the rights of every class and every section, its firm and dignified conduct of foreign affairs, and its sturdy persistence in upholding the credit and honor of the nation, are fully recognized by the Democratic party, and will secure to him a place in history beside the fathers of the Republic.
We also commend the administration for the great progress made in the reform of the public service, and we endorse its effort to extend the merit system still further. We demand that no backward step be taken, but that the reform be supported and advanced until the un-Democratic spoils system of appointments shall be eradicated.
We demand strict economy in the appropriations and in the administration of the Government.
We favor arbitration for the settlement of international disputes.
We favor a liberal policy of pensions to deserving soldiers and sailors of the United States.
The Supreme Court of the United States was wisely established by the framers of our Constitution as one of the three co-ordinate branches of the Government. Its independence and authority to interpret the law of the land without fear or favor must be maintained. We condemn all efforts to degrade that tribunal or impair the confidence and respect which it has deservedly held.
The Democratic party ever has maintained, and ever will maintain, the supremacy of law, the independence of its judicial administration, the inviolability of contracts, and the obligations of all good citizens to resist every illegal trust, combination, or attempt against the just rights of property and the good order of society, in which are bound up the peace and happiness of our people.
Believing these principles to be essential to the well-being of the Republic, we submit them to the consideration of the American people.
The National Prohibition party held its national convention at Pittsburg on the 27th of May. A. A. Stevens, of Pennsylvania, was temporary chairman, and Oliver W. Stewart, of Illinois, permanent president. The deliberations of the convention were seriously disturbed by the free-silver issue, and the opposing factions known as the “Narrow-Gaugers” and the “Broad-Gaugers,” the latter being favorable to a general platform covering free coinage and all other national questions, while the former wanted the issue confined to the liquor question. The majority and minority reports were made on the platform, and the convention decided to bring both reports before the body and pass upon them seriatim. It was finally decided by a vote of 427 to 387 to reject the free-coinage plank, and the “Narrow-Gaugers” then adopted their own platform as follows:
We, the members of the Prohibition party, in national convention assembled, renewing our declaration of allegiance to Almighty God as the rightful Ruler of the universe, lay down the following as our declaration of political purpose:
The Prohibition party, in national convention assembled, declares its firm conviction that the manufacture, exportation, importation, and sale of alcoholic beverages has produced such social, commercial, industrial, and political wrongs, and is now so threatening the perpetuity of all our social and political institutions, that the suppression of the same, by a national party organized therefor, is the greatest object to be accomplished by the voters of our country, and is of such importance that it of right ought to control the political actions of all our patriotic citizens until such suppression is accomplished.
The urgency of this course demands the union, without further delay, of all citizens who desire the prohibition of the liquor traffic; therefore be it
Resolved, That we favor the legal prohibition by State and national legislation of the manufacture, importation, and sale of alcoholic beverages. That we declare our purpose to organize and unite all the friends of prohibition into one party, and in order to accomplish this end we deem it of right to leave every Prohibitionist the freedom of his own convictions upon all other political questions, and trust our representatives to take such action upon other political questions as the changes occasioned by prohibition and the welfare of the whole people shall demand.
Resolved, That the right of suffrage ought not to be abridged on account of sex.
Immediately after the adoption of the platform, the “Broad-Gaugers” withdrew, and those who remained nominated Joshua Levering, of Maryland, for President by acclamation, and on a ballot for Vice-President, Hale Johnson, of Illinois, was chosen, receiving 309 votes to 132 for T. C. Hughes, of Arizona.
The seceders from the Prohibition convention met in Pittsburg on the next day, May 28th, with A. L. Moore, of Michigan, as chairman, and the roll-call showed 299 delegates present. Rev. Charles E. Bentley, of Nebraska, was nominated for President, and James A. Southgate, of North Carolina, was nominated for Vice-President, both by acclamation. The following platform was adopted:
The National party, recognizing God as the author of all just power in government, presents the following declaration of principles, which it pledges itself to enact into effective legislation when given the power to do so:
1. The suppression of the manufacture and sale, importation, exportation, and transportation of intoxicating liquors for beverage purposes. We utterly reject all plans for regulating or compromising with this traffic, whether such plans be called local option, taxation, license, or public control. The sale of liquors for medicinal and other legitimate uses should be conducted by the State, without profit, and with such regulations as will prevent fraud or evasion.
2. No citizen should be denied the right to vote on account of sex.
3. All money should be issued by the General Government only, and without the intervention of any private citizen, corporation, or banking institution. It should be based upon the wealth, stability, and integrity of the nation. It should be a full legal tender for all debts, public and private, and should be of sufficient volume to meet the demands of the legitimate business interests of the country. For the purpose of honestly liquidating our outstanding coin obligations, we favor the free and unlimited coinage of both silver and gold, at the ratio of 16 to 1, without consulting any other nation.
4. Land is the common heritage of the people and should be preserved from monopoly and speculation. All unearned grants of land subject to forfeiture should be reclaimed by the Government, and no portion of the public domain should hereafter be granted except to actual settlers, continuous use being essential to tenure.
5. Railroads, telegraphs, and other natural monopolies should be owned and operated by the Government, giving to the people the benefit of service at actual cost.
6. The national Constitution should be so amended as to allow the national revenues to be raised by equitable adjustment of taxation on the properties and incomes of the people, and import duties should be levied as a means of securing equitable commercial relations with other nations.
7. The contract convict labor system, through which speculators are enriched at the expense of the State, should be abolished.
8. All citizens should be protected by law in their right to one day of rest in seven, without oppressing any who conscientiously observe any other than the first day of the week.
9. The American public schools, taught in the English language, should be maintained, and no public funds should be appropriated for sectarian institutions.
10. The President, Vice-President, and United States Senators should be elected by direct vote of the people.
11. Ex-soldiers and sailors of the United States army and navy, their widows and minor children, should receive liberal pensions, graded on disability and term of service, not merely as a debt of gratitude, but for service rendered in the preservation of the Union.
12. Our immigration laws should be so revised as to exclude paupers and criminals. None but citizens of the United States should be allowed to vote in any State, and naturalized citizens should not vote until one year after naturalization papers have been issued.
13. The initiative and referendum, and proportional representation should be adopted.
The Socialist Labor party held a national convention in New York on the 4th of July, and gave a full week to the deliberations of the body, which were devoted almost wholly to disputation as to the policy and purposes of the organization. The attendance was limited, as Charles H. Matchett, of New York, was nominated for President on the 1st ballot, receiving 43 votes to 23 for Matthew Maguire, of New Jersey, and 4 for William Watkins, of Ohio. Matthew Maguire was then nominated for Vice-President by acclamation. The following platform was adopted:
The Socialist Labor party of the United States, in convention assembled, reasserts the inalienable right of all men to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
With the founders of the American Republic, we hold that the purpose of government is to secure every citizen in the enjoyment of this right; but in the light of our social conditions, we hold, furthermore, that no such right can be exercised under a system of economic inequality, essentially destructive of life, of liberty, and of happiness.
With the founders of this Republic, we hold that the true theory of politics is that the machinery of government must be owned and controlled by the whole people; but in the light of our industrial development we hold, furthermore, that the true theory of economics is that the machinery of production must likewise belong to the people in common.
To the obvious fact, that our despotic system of economics is the direct opposite of our democratic system of politics, can plainly be traced the existence of a privileged class, the corruption of government by that class, the alienation of public property, public franchises, and public functions to that class, and the abject dependence of the mightiest nations upon that class.
Again, through the perversion of Democracy to the ends of plutocracy, labor is robbed of the wealth which it alone produces, is denied the means of self-employment, and, by compulsory idleness in wage slavery, is even deprived of the necessaries of life. Human power and natural forces are thus wasted that the plutocracy may rule. Ignorance and misery, with all their concomitant evils, are perpetuated, that the people may be kept in bondage. Science and invention are diverted from their humane purpose to the enslavement of women and children.
Against such a system the Socialist Labor party once more enters its protest. Once more it reiterates its fundamental declaration, that private property in the natural sources of production and in the instruments of labor is the obvious cause of all economic servitude and political dependence.
The time is fast coming when, in the natural course of social evolution, this system, through the destructive action of its failures and crises on the one hand, and the constructive tendencies of its trusts and other capitalistic combinations on the other hand, shall have worked out its own downfall.
We therefore call upon the wage-workers of the United States, and upon all other honest citizens, to organize under the banner of the Socialist Labor party into a class-conscious body, aware of its rights and determined to conquer them by taking possession of the public powers; so that, held together by an indomitable spirit of solidarity under the most trying conditions of the present class struggle, we may put a summary end to that barbarous struggle by the abolition of classes, the restoration of the land, and of all the means of production, transportation, and distribution to the people as a collective body, and the substitution of the co-operative commonwealth for the present state of planless production, industrial war, and social disorder; a commonwealth in which every worker shall have the free exercise and full benefit of his faculties, multiplied by all the modern factors of civilization.
With a view to immediate improvement in the condition of labor, we present the following demands:
1. Reduction of the hours of labor in proportion to the progress of production.
2. The United States to obtain possession of the mines, railroads, canals, telegraphs, telephones, and all other means of public transportation and communication; the employés to operate the same co-operatively under control of the Federal Government and to elect their own superior officers, but no employé shall be discharged for political reasons.
3. The municipalities to obtain possession of the local railroads, ferries, water-works, gas-works, electric plants, and all industries requiring municipal franchises; the employés to operate the same co-operatively under control of the municipal administration and to elect their own superior officers, but no employé shall be discharged for political reasons.
4. The public lands to be declared inalienable. Revocation of all land grants to corporations or individuals, the conditions of which have not been complied with.
5. The United States to have the exclusive right to issue money.
6. Congressional legislation providing for the scientific management of forests and waterways, and prohibiting the waste of the natural resources of the country.
7. Inventions to be free to all; the inventors to be remunerated by the nation.
8. Progressive income tax and tax on inheritances; the smaller incomes to be exempt.
9. School education of all children under fourteen years of age to be compulsory, gratuitous, and accessible to all by public assistance in meals, clothing, books, etc., where necessary.
10. Repeal of all pauper, tramp, conspiracy, and sumptuary laws. Unabridged right of combination.
11. Prohibition of the employment of children of school age, and the employment of female labor in occupations detrimental to health or morality. Abolition of the convict labor contract system.
12. Employment of the unemployed by the public authorities (county, city, state, and nation).
13. All wages to be paid in lawful money of the United States. Equalization of women’s wages with those of men where equal service is performed.
14. Laws for the protection of life and limb in all occupations, and an efficient employers’ liability law.
15. The people to have the right to propose laws and to vote upon all measures of importance, according to the referendum principle.
16. Abolition of the veto power of the executive (national, State, and municipal) wherever it exists.
17. Abolition of the United States Senate and all upper legislative chambers.
18. Municipal self-government.
19. Direct vote and secret ballots in all elections. Universal and equal right of suffrage without regard to color, creed, or sex. Election days to be legal holidays. The principle of proportional representation to be introduced.
20. All public officers to be subject to recall by their respective constituencies.
21. Uniform civil and criminal law throughout the United States. Administration of justice to be free of charge. Abolition of capital punishment.
The great battle of 1896 is yet fresh in the memories of the people. Its most notable feature was the unexampled campaign made by Bryan, the Democratic candidate for President. He covered a larger portion of territory and delivered more speeches during the campaign than had ever before been accomplished by any man in our political history, and he enthused his followers to a very remarkable degree. Considering the complications which confronted him, resulting from the internal feuds of his own household, and an open split on the Vice-Presidency, he made the most memorable Presidential campaign of the Republic and swept every State west of the Mississippi, with the exception of California, Oregon and North Dakota. Even Kansas and Nebraska, two rock-ribbed Republican States, gave Bryan large majorities, but Bryan did not carry a single electoral vote east of the Mississippi and north of the Ohio and the Potomac. The following tables exhibit the popular and electoral votes of 1896:
| STATES. | William McKinley, Ohio. | William J. Bryan, Nebraska. | Bryan and Watson.[31] | John M. Palmer, Illinois. | Joshua Levering, Maryland. | Charles E. Bentley, Nebraska. | Charles H. Matchett, New York. |
| Alabama | 54,737 | 131,226 | 24,089 | 6,462 | 2,147 | —— | —— |
| Arkansas | 37,512 | 110,103 | —— | —— | 839 | 893 | —— |
| California | 146,688 | 144,766 | 21,730 | 2,006 | 2,573 | 1,047 | 1,611 |
| Colorado | 26,271 | 161,269 | 2,389 | 1 | 1,717 | 386 | 160 |
| Connecticut | 110,285 | 56,740 | —— | 4,336 | 1,806 | —— | 1,223 |
| Delaware | 20,452 | 16,615 | —— | 966 | 602 | —— | —— |
| Florida | 11,257 | 31,958 | 1,977 | 1,772 | 644 | —— | —— |
| Georgia | 60,091 | 94,672 | 440 | 2,708 | 5,716 | —— | —— |
| Idaho | 6,324 | 23,192 | —— | —— | 181 | —— | —— |
| Illinois | 607,130 | 464,523 | 1,090 | 6,390 | 9,796 | 793 | 1,147 |
| Indiana | 323,754 | 305,573 | —— | 2,145 | 3,056 | 2,267 | 324 |
| Iowa | 289,293 | 223,741 | —— | 4,516 | 3,192 | 352 | 453 |
| Kansas | 159,541 | 171,810 | 46,194 | 1,209 | 1,921 | 630 | —— |
| Kentucky | 218,171 | 217,890 | —— | 5,114 | 4,781 | —— | —— |
| Louisiana | 22,037 | 77,175 | —— | 1,915 | —— | —— | —— |
| Maine | 80,461 | 34,587 | 2,387 | 1,866 | 1,589 | —— | —— |
| Maryland | 136,978 | 104,746 | —— | 2,507 | 5,922 | 136 | 588 |
| Massachusetts | 278,976 | 105,711 | 15,181 | 11,749 | 2,998 | —— | 2,114 |
| Michigan | 293,582 | 237,268 | —— | 6,968 | 5,025 | 1,995 | 297 |
| Minnesota | 193,503 | 139,735 | —— | 3,222 | 4,363 | —— | 954 |
| Mississippi | 5,123 | 63,793 | 7,517 | 1,071 | 485 | —— | —— |
| Missouri | 304,940 | 363,652 | —— | 2,355 | 2,169 | 293 | 599 |
| Montana | 10,494 | 42,537 | —— | —— | 186 | —— | —— |
| Nebraska | 103,064 | 115,999 | —— | 2,797 | 1,243 | 797 | 186 |
| Nevada | 1,938 | 8,377 | 575 | —— | —— | —— | —— |
| New Hampshire | 57,444 | 21,650 | 379 | 3,520 | 779 | 49 | 228 |
| New Jersey | 221,367 | 133,675 | —— | 6,373 | 5,614 | —— | 3,985 |
| New York | 819,838 | 551,369 | —— | 18,950 | 16,052 | —— | 17,667 |
| North Carolina | 155,222 | 174,488 | —— | 578 | 676 | 245 | —— |
| North Dakota | 26,335 | 20,686 | —— | —— | 358 | —— | —— |
| Ohio | 525,991 | 477,497 | 2,615 | 1,858 | 5,068 | 2,716 | 1,167 |
| Oregon | 48,779 | 46,662 | —— | 977 | 919 | —— | —— |
| Pennsylvania | 728,300 | 433,230 | 11,176 | 10,921 | 19,274 | 870 | 1,683 |
| Rhode Island | 37,437 | 14,459 | —— | 1,166 | 1,160 | 5 | 558 |
| South Carolina | 9,313 | 58,801 | —— | 824 | —— | —— | —— |
| South Dakota | 41,042 | 41,225 | —— | —— | 683 | —— | —— |
| Tennessee | 148,773 | 166,268 | 4,525 | 1,951 | 3,098 | —— | —— |
| Texas | 167,520 | 370,434 | 79,572 | 5,046 | 1,786 | —— | —— |
| Utah | 13,491 | 64,607 | —— | 21 | —— | —— | —— |
| Vermont | 50,991 | 10,607 | 461 | 1,329 | 728 | —— | —— |
| Virginia | 135,388 | 154,985 | —— | 2,127 | 2,350 | —— | 115 |
| Washington | 39,153 | 51,646 | —— | 1,668 | 968 | 148 | —— |
| West Virginia | 104,414 | 92,927 | —— | 677 | 1,203 | —— | —— |
| Wisconsin | 268,135 | 165,523 | —— | 4,584 | 7,509 | 346 | 1,314 |
| Wyoming | 10,072 | 10,655 | 286 | —— | 136 | —— | —— |
| Totals | 7,111,607 | 6,509,052 | 222,583 | 134,645 | 131,312 | 13,968 | 36,373 |
| STATES. | President. | Vice-President. | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| McKinley. | Bryan. | Hobart. | Sewall. | Watson. | |
| Alabama | — | 11 | — | 11 | — |
| Arkansas | — | 8 | — | 5 | 3 |
| California | 8 | 1 | 8 | 1 | — |
| Colorado | — | 4 | — | 4 | — |
| Connecticut | 6 | — | 6 | — | — |
| Delaware | 3 | — | 3 | — | — |
| Florida | — | 4 | — | 4 | — |
| Georgia | — | 13 | — | 13 | — |
| Idaho | — | 3 | — | 3 | — |
| Illinois | 24 | — | 24 | — | — |
| Indiana | 15 | — | 15 | — | — |
| Iowa | 13 | — | 13 | — | — |
| Kansas | — | 10 | — | 10 | — |
| Kentucky | 12 | 1 | 12 | 1 | — |
| Louisiana | — | 8 | — | 4 | 4 |
| Maine | 6 | — | 6 | — | — |
| Maryland | 8 | — | 8 | — | — |
| Massachusetts | 15 | — | 15 | — | — |
| Michigan | 14 | — | 14 | — | — |
| Minnesota | 9 | — | 9 | — | — |
| Mississippi | — | 9 | — | 9 | — |
| Missouri | — | 17 | — | 13 | 4 |
| Montana | — | 3 | — | 2 | 1 |
| Nebraska | — | 8 | — | 4 | 4 |
| Nevada | — | 3 | — | 3 | — |
| New Hampshire | 4 | — | 4 | — | — |
| New Jersey | 10 | — | 10 | — | — |
| New York | 36 | — | 36 | — | — |
| North Carolina | — | 11 | — | 6 | 5 |
| North Dakota | 3 | — | 3 | — | — |
| Ohio | 23 | — | 23 | — | — |
| Oregon | 4 | — | 4 | — | — |
| Pennsylvania | 32 | — | 32 | — | — |
| Rhode Island | 4 | — | 4 | — | — |
| South Carolina | — | 9 | — | 9 | — |
| South Dakota | — | 4 | — | 2 | 2 |
| Tennessee | — | 12 | — | 12 | — |
| Texas | — | 15 | — | 15 | — |
| Utah | — | 3 | — | 2 | 1 |
| Vermont | 4 | — | 4 | — | — |
| Virginia | — | 12 | — | 12 | — |
| Washington | — | 4 | — | 2 | 2 |
| West Virginia | 6 | — | 6 | — | — |
| Wisconsin | 12 | — | 12 | — | — |
| Wyoming | — | 3 | — | 2 | 1 |
| Totals | 271 | 176 | 271 | 149 | 27 |
No mere party contest in the history of the country, and indeed no other contest, with the single exception of the issue of secession and civil war, ever exhibited so large a measure of political independence as is shown in the vote for President in 1896. While the Democrats had a sound-money national ticket with such acceptable candidates as Palmer and Buckner, a very small proportion of the sound-money Democratic vote of the country was cast for that ticket. McKinley certainly received 500,000 Democratic votes, cast for him directly to assure the defeat of Bryan, and Bryan certainly received not less than 250,000 Republican votes.
It was not until six weeks before the election that the Republicans felt confident of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The first canvass of the Republican State committee made in Ohio indicated the defeat of McKinley, but as the business and industrial interests of the country faced the question of cheap money, and the business convulsion it must produce, the Republican ranks were steadily increased, and the States which were regarded as doubtful in September gave large majorities for McKinley in November.
This campaign gave a most impressive illustration of the true independence of American journalism. A number of the leading newspapers of the country which had supported Cleveland in his three contests, repudiated the Chicago platform and its candidate, and they stood in the forefront of American journalism, embracing such journals as the Boston Herald and Globe, the Hartford Times, the New York World, Sun, Herald, Times, and Evening Post, the Philadelphia Times and Record, the Baltimore Sun, the Louisville Courier-Journal, and others. These journals were all strongly owned and entirely independent in their political action. Not one of them ever had conference or communication with the McKinley leaders, or received or proposed any terms for their support, or ever sought, accepted, or desired favors from the McKinley administration. Some of them suffered pecuniary sacrifice, but they performed a heroic duty, and it was the inspiration they gave to the conservative Democratic sentiment of the country that made McKinley President by an overwhelming majority.
On the other side, especially in the West, and to some extent in the South, scores of thousands of the Republicans who had always voted the national ticket gave enthusiastic support to Bryan, as he carried some of the strongest Republican States of the West, while losing a large fraction of the Democratic vote. This struggle settled the financial policy of the country, as Congress has recently distinctly established the gold standard by statute, in accord with the financial policy of all the great civilized nations of the world; and while the money issue may play some part in the national struggle of the present year, it will be wisely subordinated to other issues and probably be eliminated from the future political battles of the nation.