Not long afterwards the following personal acknowledgement was received:
September 22nd, 1906.
Hon. Thos. E. Watson.
My Dear Mr. Watson:
I received your letter at Augusta and thank you very much for your cordial greeting.
I am sorry that it was impossible for us to stop over with you. It is gratifying to know from what I have learned that we are going to be able to act together in the coming contest. There has been a remarkable change in public sentiment, so that things that were formerly denounced as radical are now regarded as not only quite reasonable, but even necessary. If you come our way, we shall be glad again to see you, only hoping that you may have more time than when you last visited us. Mrs. Bryan joins me in best wishes.
Very truly yours,
W. J. BRYAN.
***
Mr. Bryan says: “It is gratifying to know from what I have learned that we are going to be able to act together in the coming contest.”
Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to see the National Democratic party undergo a general casting out of the unclean spirits that have taken possession of it. If it should become truly Democratic, if it should return to the principles of the fathers, if it should renounce Hamilton and all his works, if it should rebaptize itself in the creed of Jefferson, if its National organization should expel every tool of the Trusts, every agent of Wall street, every beneficiary of special Privilege—then the Democratic party would stand for substantially the same things as The People’s Party.