VOL. XIV.

The Election and the Business Revival.

The people of the United States are immensely relieved when a presidential election is accomplished and off their hands, no matter what the outcome may be. The campaign period always covers from fifteen to twenty weeks, and the strain and suspense become extremely hard to bear as the contest proceeds. At no time since 1860 has so much significance been attached to a presidential election as to the one just concluded; and consequently the sense of relief felt by the community in having the thing settled in favor of the status quo has shown itself in unprecedented ways. The election of Mr. Bryan would have meant a popular demand for a change in the standard of values. The whole business of the country is now transacted within the walls of a colossal edifice of confidence and credit, resting upon the foundation of the gold standard. It was believed by the business world that Mr. Bryan's election might give such a seismic shock to that foundation as to shake to pieces the whole superstructure of credit and confidence. The effect, therefore, upon business while such a campaign was being waged may be likened to the sudden paralysis overtaking the house-building industry of some fast-growing city if scientists should gravely prophesy that destructive earthquake shocks might soon be expected in that region. Nobody knew exactly what would happen, as regards the relative market value of gold and silver, if Mr. Bryan should be elected; but business men were generally agreed that there would be severe disturbances. And the mere prospect of disturbances destroys confidence and paralyzes credit. The election of Mr. McKinley was taken by the business community to mean that the accustomed basis of value would not be changed, and that we shall continue, at least until after the end of this nineteenth century, to use the same standard of measurements as England, France, Germany and the principal commercial nations of the world are using. This assurance was what the business men of the United States seemed principally to desire. The effect of the election was magical in its restoration of commercial confidence. Buying and selling were immediately resumed, and the demand for goods of all kinds led to the opening of hundreds of factories which had been shut down for a considerable time.

The Triumph of American Conservatism.

No. 6.

Whatever else was demonstrated by the course of the campaign and the result of the election, there was shown beyond all question the essential conservatism and sagacity of the American people. The pessimists who have been pronouncing universal suffrage a failure, and popular self-government a disappointing experiment, can find no confirmation of their views in any fair interpretation of this last election. Speaking broadly, the whole American people can be better trusted to govern the country honestly, wisely and with patient self-control, than any selected element or section of the people could be trusted. Popular self government is a long way from perfection, to be sure; but it happens to be nearer perfect than any other form of government that could possibly enter into rivalry with it. The questions at issue in this last election, in spite of the opinion of many excellent persons to the contrary, were exceedingly difficult and perplexing questions. Nearly all the public men of all parties, big politicians and little politicians alike, have for twenty years been adversely criticising the gold standard, and professing their earnest desire at the earliest possible moment to make silver a full money metal again. In pursuance of policies looking as their goal towards the ultimate restoration of silver to open and unlimited coinage, our government had by purchase accumulated by far the vastest quantity of the white metal ever assembled in the history of the world. It was inevitable that the time must come when one of the great parties would take its stand in favor of the completion of the programme and the full acceptance of silver. A few years ago, nobody could have foretold with certainty which of the great parties would find itself at length committed to the policy of independent American bimetallism. Although a Democratic President led the sharp reaction against the silver policy which, in 1893, secured the repeal of the compulsory silver purchase law of 1890, it happened that the silver men found the Republican party, by reason of its superior strength in the old commercial communities of the North and East, least willing to break away from the international measure of value; while the Democratic party, with its superior strength in the agricultural states of the South, where the silver sentiment had obtained a stronghold, proved unexpectedly easy of

capture. The enthusiasm with which the Democratic party promulgated its free-silver and antimonopoly platform, and enlisted under the banner of its ardent and self-confident young nominee, seemed for a time to be almost irresistible. Its appeal was made to farmers and workingmen with 'passionate earnestness. Nearly all the prominent leaders of the anti-silver forces had at some time or other denounced the gold standard and demanded the restoration of silver in language which was now widely quoted against them with great effect. A large majority of the people of the country are farmers and wage earners. In view of the real difficul

ties under which agriculture has labored, and the dull times which have brought the wolf near the door of the average workingman, it would not have been a very conclusive proof of the failure of popular government if the free silver cause had triumphed at the polls. The Senate of the United States had been absolutely controlled by the free silver men for several years. If the states from which those Senators came had given large popular majorities in favor of the silver doctrine, at a time when restlessness and discontent due to industrial stagnation tempted the people to vote for some radical change, why should it have been thought very surprising? The thing that has made philosophers doubtful of the safety of popular self-government has been the fear that changes would be demanded capriciously, and that civilization would suffer through the impatience and violence of great masses of men swayed by the spirit of radicalism. severer test than that of this year is not likely to be made in our time; and the philosophers are answered. The American people, taken in the great mass, are shown to be fundamentally conservative.

A

The Verdict Conclusive.

Through the early half of the campaign, the confidence of Mr. Bryan's principal leaders was unbounded. They believed that his popular majority was sure to be vastly larger than any majority ever before given to a presidential candidate. Many of them went so far as to predict that Mr. Bryan would carry every state in the Union. There had come to his support the Democratic party, the Populist party, the American Silver party, the net-work of semi-political labor organizations, and the agricultural interest in the main, so far as it was articulate through Farmers' Alliances and similar organizations; and the great undercurrent seemed to have set irresistibly towards the Bryan combination. But this movement that was launched as the most invincible one ever known in the history of American politics, was in fact beaten by the largest majority ever rolled up in a presidential election. Approximately 13,000,000 votes were cast, and Mr. McKinley's plurality over Mr. Bryan is about a million. The largest plurality ever given before in the history of the country was President Grant's over Mr. Greeley in 1872, which slightly exceeded three quarters of a million. No other plurality ever reached a full half-million. Even if it were our opinion. --which of course our readers know it is not,-that a popular verdict in favor of the free coinage of silver would in fact have resulted advantageously for the country, we should nevertheless look upon the outcome of the election last month as a magnificent vindication of the capacity of the American people for self-government. No great popular verdict was ever given in a fashion more deliberate, intelligent and untrammelled. The American people simply declared at the polls that they could afford to keep on the

hum-drum, safe side. The 7,000,000 men or more who voted for McKinley were not acting under any dictation or duress. Whatever moral coercion of employed men by employers may have been attempted, it could not have affected the result to any appreciable extent. Nor was this a vote-buying campaign on either side. Never since the war have the voters in so large proportion carried their honest manhood into the campaign, or based their action so wholly upon their sincere convictions. It does not follow in the least that the country is satisfied with all things as they are, or that public opinion would not favor many judicious reforms. But it is demonstrated, once and for all, that the country will not sanction economic experiments so fundamental in their nature as the free coinage of silver would be under existing circumstances. The verdict is conclusive.

pretty evident that the East would go solidly for McKinley and that the far South and far West would in the main support Bryan. Thus one-third of the total number of electoral votes were practically sure for Bryan, one-third were sure for McKinley, and the victory was seen to depend upon the question which candidate should win a major

ty of the votes of the remaining third. This carried the final battle into the middle Western states, and it was there that the victory for sound money was secured. Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan gave great majorities for the Republican ticket,-much larger majorities, indeed, than had been expected by the Republican managers. Ohio and Indiana yielded respectable pluralities, but fell considerably short of expectations. McKinley's success in North Dakota was under the circumstances a notable triumph, and it was something to have come so near carrying the erstwhile Populist state of South Dakota that the result was in doubt for many days. A careful study of the facts and conditions of the campaign convinces us that the victory for sound money is final and never to be reversed as regards all the states which gave pluralities for the McKinley electors. There was nothing haphazard or accidental about the verdict in any of those states. If Mr. Bryan were to try issues again on the same platform, it is altogether probable that in all these states which declared against him last month the adverse majorities would be further increased, -not for reasons personal to Mr. Bryan, but through an invincible objection to his programme. On the other hand it is more than possible that half a dozen states which last month were carried by the Bryan electors would, after a little further discussion of the questions involved, conclude to array themselves upon the conservative side. In Mr. Bryan's own state of Nebraska, the election was very close; and a change of 4,000 votes would have put Kansas into the Republican column. As for Tennessee, there are reasons for believing that the sound money cause, if submitted to the voters to-morrow on its pure merits, would carry the state by a good majority. The map on the preceding page gives an appearance of prevalence to the silver sentiment that the facts do not sustain.