Page images
PDF
EPUB

THE PRESIDENTIAL CONTEST OF 1896.

con-, those platforms, the speeches which placed them before the people as candidates for their votes, and sketches of their lives and careers form no uninteresting theme.

Proceedings of the great national ventions of 1896 have become a part of the political history of the United States. Whatever may be written of them in the time to come can never deal so clearly and with such accuracy of detail as the record which the columns of the Eagle daily set before its readers.

The value of such an historic record may be but little appreciated by those even greatly interested in the events which pass to make it. Preservation of present events, in any form of sequence, is but rare and yet the value of such a work becomes apparent within the month and grows to large proportions with advancing time.

It is the purpose here to place in straightforward and succinct form the story of the national conventions as the happenings of each were published in the Eagle as they ran.

In addition there will be found in the following pages the votes by states on platforms and candidates, forming a valuable table of reference. Supplemental to this will be found the story of the action taken by the silver delegates on leaving the Republican convention and the farewell address of Senator Teller; the speech which above all else led to the nomination of William Jennings Bryan at Chicago and other details of the conventions which go to make a complete history of their work.

The Republican national convention met at St. Louis on Tuesday, June 16. The Democratic national convention opened in Chicago on Tuesday, July 7, and the Popuplatforms of the parties, the candidates for list convention opened in St. Louis on TuesPresident and vice president nominated on day, July 22.

The

In the Republican convention the silver issue made its appearance very early in the session on the discussion of the financial plank in the proposed platform. It was upon this issue that Senator Teller and those delegates holding his views upon the silver question decided to leave the convention should the gold plank be adopted. Senator Teller was aware of the attitude of the convention on the financial issue before the vote

was taken, and it was in protesting against the adoption of that issue that he made the following address, not more in protest than

farewell:

Senator Teller's Speech. "Gentlemen of the convention-I will not attempt to inflict upon you a discussion of the great financial question which is dividing the people, not only of this country, but of the world. The few moments allotted to me by the convention will not enable me to more than state, in the briefest manner, our objections to the financial plank proposed for our consideration. I am a practical man and I recognize the conditions existing in this convention, foreshadowed as they were by the action of the committee selected by the Republicans essembled from different states.

"This plank or the proposition was presented to the whole committee and by it rejected. Loyalty to my own opinion and consideration of the great interest that is felt in this country, compels me in the face of unusual difficulties to present this for our consideration, not with that bounding hope nor with that courage that I have presented in other bodies with greater measure of success than I can hope for here.

"The great and supreme importance of this question is alone my excuse for the few words that I shall say to you. In conjunction with this subject in a public capacity I have dealt for twenty years. I represent a state that produces silver, but I want to say to you here and now that my advocacy is not in the slightest degree influenced by that fact. (Applause and a voice, "Good.")

"I contend for it because I believe that there can be no sound financial system in any country in the world that does not recognize this principle. I contend for it because since 1873, when it was ruthlessly stricken from our statutes, there has been a continued depreciation of all products of human labor and human energy. I contend for it because in this year of 1896 the American people are in greater distress than they ever were in their history. I contend for it because this is, in my judgment, the great weight, the great incubus that has weighed down enterprises and destroyed prices in this favored land of ours. I contend for it because I believe the progress of my country is dependent on it. I contend for it because I believe that the civilization of the world is to be determined by the rightful or the wrongful solution of this financial question.

"I am tolerant of those who differ with me. I act from my own judgment, enlightened as best I have been able to enlighten it by my

years of study and by years of thought. In my judgment the American people in the whole line of their history have never been called upon to settle a question of greater importance to them than this.

"The great contest, in which many of you participated, of whether we should have two flags or one, was not more important to the American people than the question of a proper solution of what shall be the money system of this land.

"I have said enough to show that I think that this is not a question of policy, but a question of principle. It is not a mere idle thing, but one on which hangs the happiness, the prosperity, the morality and the independence of American labor and American producers. (Applause.) Confronted for the first time in the history of this glorious party of ours-confronted, I say, for the first timewith a danger of a financial system that, in my judgment, will be destructive of all the great interests of this land, we are called upon to give to this provision of our platform our adhesion or rejection.

"Mr. President, I do not desire to say unkind or unfriendly things and I will touch in a moment and only a moment upon why I object to this provision of this patform. The Republican party has never been the party of a single standard. (Applause.) It was a bimetallic party in its origin and all its history. In 1888 it declared for bimetallism. In 1892 it declared for bimetallism. In 1896 it declared for a single gold standard. In 1888 we carried the state that I here represent for the Republican nominee. We carried it on a bimetallic platform. We carried it with a majority that equaled, considering our vote, any state in the Union. (Applause.) It has been a Republican state from the hour of its admission. It has kept in the senate Republican senators and in the house Republican members.

"Mr. President, I promised you that I would not discuss the silver question, and I will not, except to say that this platform is such a distinct departure from everything heretofore adopted by the party that it challenges our Republican name to accept it. The platform contains some platitudes about international conferences. It provides that we will maintain the gold standard in this country until the principal nations of the world shall agree that we may do otherwise. This is the first gathering of Republicans since this party was organized that has declared the inability of the American people to control their own affairs. All the silver delegates arose in a body at this and howled their approval of the sentiment.)

"To my horror this declaration from the great political party of Abraham Lincoln and U. S. Grant! Do you believe that the American people are too weak to actually maintain a financial system commensurate with the business of the country on their own fruition. Gentlemen of the convention, you will have no bi-metallic agreement with all the great commercial nations of the world, and it cannot be obtained. Sothis is a declaration, that the gold standard is to be put upon this country and kept here for all time. Do you believe that Great Britain, that commercial nation of the world, our powerful competitor in commerce

and trade, will ever agree to open her mints | to the coinage of silver? Or that we shall open ours? We are the great debtor nation of the world. Great Britain is the great creditor. We pay for every millions and hundreds of millions of dollars as income on her investment in this country and on her loans. The gold standard, in my judgment, lowers prices and decreases values. And she buys of us millions and millions more than she sells us. She buys upon a gold standard, a lowering and depreciating standard. How long do you think it will be before she will agree to a system of values that raises the price of the farm product or the products of our mines in this country? It is a solemn declaration that the Republican party intends to maintain low prices and stagnated business for all time to come. (Cheers from the silver states.)

"There is a beautiful provison in the platform about the tariff. I subscribe to that. (Applause and cheers from all over the house.) I believe in a protective tariff. (More applause.) I have advocated it for forty years (applause), but it is my solemn conviction that a protective tariff cannot be maintained upon a gold standard. (Applause and cheers from the silver people.) The tariff of protection principles is for the raising of prices of human toil, it is for the good of the producers, for their labors. The gold standard, on the contrary, everywhere that it is enforced, is much for the purpose of reducing values.

"Now gentlemen of the convention, I am going to make this simple objection as to the protective system-that it is in danger and I will call your attention to the other fact and then I leave it to your judgment whether this platform shall be adopted or rejected. Under existing conditions we undoubtedly have the gold standard. I do not deny that I have sought for twenty years to change it to the bi-metallic system. I have believed and yet believe that when the Almighty created these metals he intended that the world should use them for what they were created. (Applause from silver men.) And when he blessed this land with more gold and more silver than any other country he meant that we should use them for the purposes for which they were intended, to wit: The use of the people as standard money. We to-day reverse the positions of our country and declare we will use only one. If the American people are in favor of that, I have nothing to say. I must submit to the majority vote and the majority voice in this country of ours. I do not believe this party of ours, if it could be polled, is in favor of the gold standard. I believe that 50 per cent. of the people are in favor of bimetallism of the old fashioned system that existed in this country up to 1873.

binding on my conscience. I believe the adoption of the gold standard will produce hardships and increase distress and that no legislation touching the tariff can remove the difficulties that now, all admit, prevail in this land. I believe that the whole welfare of my race is dependent upon a rightful solution of this question; that the morality, the civilization; ray, the very religion of my country is at stake in this contest. I know, and you know, that men in distress are neither patriotic nor brave. You and I know that hunger and distress will destroy patriotism and love of country."

be

"To have love of country, patriotic fervor and independence, you must have your citizens comfortably fed and comfortably clothed. That is what made me a Republican; that is what has made me a Republican during all these years, because I believed that the Republican party was made for the good of men; that its legislation was intended to lift up and elevate and hold up and sustain the distressed and give every citizen opportunities before the law. (Applause.) I do not believe that it can had with the gold standard. You may doubt my argument and many of you will, but shall I doubt it? I must act upon my judgment and not upon yours. I must answer to my conscience and not my neighbors'. I must do my duty as it is presented to me and not as presented to you. I say to you now that with the solemn conviction upon me that this gold plank means ultimate disaster and distress to my followers, I cannot subscribe to it, ana if adopted, I must, as an honest man, sever my connection with the political organization which makes the gold standard one of the main articles of its principles. (Applause.) I repeat here what I said yesterday in the committee, I would not, upon my judgment alone, carefully as I have attempted to prepare it, dare to take this step alone.

"My friends, I am sustained in my view of the danger that is coming to us and coming to the world by the adoption of the gold standard, by the intelligence of the world. They may say that the silver question is dead. Let me tell you that the best part of the world is with the advocates of bimetallism. All the great political teachers of Europe, with the exception of five or six, are the pronounced advocates of bimetallism-unrestrained bimetallism. All the great teachers of political ecomony in the European colleges without exception are in favor of bimetallism. My own judgment, based, as I have said to you, on careful preparation and careful study for twenty years, bears me out and puts me in accord with them, and I would be recreant

I failed when the Republican party makes this one of the tenets of its faith. to sever my connection with that party. (Applause and cries of 'No.')

"Mr. President and gentlemen of the conven- to my trust if I failed to protest here, and if tion, I promised that I would take but a few minutes, and I believe I am allowed only a few in which I can rapidly address you. But I want to say a few things that may seem to you to be personal and that they ought not to be introduced in an audience like this. I must beg your indulgence if I seem to transcend the proprieties of this occasion, if I shall say something personal of myself.

"I have formed my convictions on this great question after twenty years of study. after twenty years of careful thought and careful reading. I have been trained in a school that it seems to me ought to fit me fairly well for reaching just conclusions from established facts. I have formed my conclusions to such an extent that it has become

Mr. President. I ask your kind permission to say a few things personal to myself, and when I have said them. having told you what my conscience demands that I should do, I will leave this question for your consideration. Do you suppose that myself and my associates who act with me and take the same view of this question that I do-do you suppose that we can take this step without distress? Do you suppose that we could take it for any personal advantage or any honor that could be conferred upon us? We say it is a question of duty. You may nominate in this con

[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small]

vention any man you choose-if you nominate
the right kind of platform I will vote for
him. You may take any methods to nominate
him that you think proper. I will defer to
your judgment and support him if the plat-
form is a right one; but when you ask me to
surrender to you my principles, as an honest
man, I cannot do that. I realize what it will
cost. I realize the gibes and sneers and the
contumely that will be heaped upon it; but,
my fellow citizens, I have been through this
before before the political party to which
you belong had a being. I have advocated a
cause more unpopular than the silver cause.
I have stood for the doctrine of
free homes and free speech, and
I do rot care what may be the result.
it takes me out of political life, I will go out
with a feeling that manhood and my con-
science is clear and that my country will
have no right to find fault with me. (Cheers.)
"I beg your pardon for saying things so
personal, but yet if a personal act that to
some implies perfidy and dishonor, is about to
be taken, I think it but just to myself, and
my associates, that I should proclaim to you
that we may take this step not in anger, not in
pique, not because we dislike the nominee
prospectively or otherwise, but because our
conscience requires, as honest men, that we
should make this sacrifice, for sacrifice we feel
that it is.

If

"Thanking you, gentlemen, for your kind attention. retiring from you as I do perhaps never again to have the opportunity of addressing a Republican convention, I cannot do it without saying that, after all, I have in my heart a hope-nay I have an expectation-that if you should be foolish enough to adopt this platform, better counsel will prevail and ultimately on a true Republican platform, sustaining Republican principles, I shall have the inestimable privilege of again addressing you.”

The Financial Plank.

[blocks in formation]

.923

Total
8122 1101/2
The total vote was 923; divided, 8121⁄2 yeas;
1101⁄2 nays.

Senator Teller and his fellow members then retired from the convention, which promptly proceeded to adopt the platform as follows: The Republican Platform.

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 thirty years of Republican rule, earnestly and confidently address themselves to the awakened intelligences, experience and conscience of their countrymen in the following declaration of facts and principles:

It

For the first time since the civil war the American people have witnessed the calamitous consequences of a full and unrestricted Democratic control of the government. has been a record of unparallel incapacity, dishonor and disaster. In administrative management it has ruthlessly sacrified indispensible 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 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 3 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 to conduct it without disaster at home and dis2 honor abroad, and shall be restored to the party which for thirty years administered it with unequaled success and prosperity, and in this connection we heartily indorse the wisdom. patriotism and success of the administration of President Harrison.

It was decided that a separate vote should be taken on the financial plank, to which the silvermen had objected. The vote was as follows:

State.

Alabama

Arkansas

California

Colorado

Connecticut

Delaware

Florida

Georgia

Idaho

Illinois

Vote. Yeas. Nays.

19

1

8

..

1

1

22

16

15

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

THE TARIFF PLANK.

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

« PreviousContinue »