Self respect will not permit us longer to defer to the arrogant assumptions of those whose financial policy leaves the Treasury unarmed, unguarded, unpicketed against the raids of Wall street highwaymen, and brings the farmer so low that his products go like salvation, without money and without price. After the rank incompetence manifested by our financiers during recent years that they should still presume to instruct anybody is the very impudence of arrogant audacity. Columbia has reached her majority. We now propose that she conduct her own affairs without dictation from foreign financiers or suggestion from foreign parliament. We intend to enforce every sentence, every clause, every word, which Thomas Jefferson put in the Declaration of Independence. We hoped for better things from the Republican party. Long enough has humanity walked through the fiery furnace. Soon or never must God's poor be led by stiller waters and into greener pastures. In spite of Confucius and Buddha, of Socrates in prison, of Jesus of Nazareth on the Cross, power is still arrogant, greed is still impudent, and talent is still selfish. The time has come to determine whether this nation is ruled by an Almighty Dollar or by an Almighty God.

In a few days William J. Bryan of Nebraska will stand in Maḍison Square Garden-the champion of Lazarus at the gates of Dives. Both will be present. The Roman ambassador stood before the Carthaginian Senate and said: "I hold peace and war in the folds of my toga. Which shall I shake out to you?" The Carthaginians cried, "War, war," and were swept from the earth. The eloquent Senator Vilas of Wisconsin said at Chicago: "Perhaps somewhere in this country there lurks a Robespierre, a Danton, a Marat." I will eliminate the perhaps for the distinguished senator. Always in the swamps of want, in the jungles of poverty there lurks a Robespierre, a Danton, a Marat. There be men in this country who will do well to listen to Mirabeau that Danton shall never come. Christ forgave the thief and pardoned the courtesan, but the money changers he scourged from the temple. Long enough has selfish and greedy thrift dominated the councils of the Republic. Washington never fought, Warren never fell to establish an oligarchy of baronial millionaires. Eighteen centuries have passed away, but it is not yet too late to crucify Barabbas. The people have accepted the challenge Wall street issued at St. Louis. Pleasant it is for the Little Tin Gods,

When the Great Jove nods.

But the Little Tin Gods make their mistakes,

That they miss the hour when the Great Jove wakes.

The sophistical logic of "business" argument cannot avoid, the enticing glitter of Lombard gold cannot disguise, the sonorous periods of rounded eloquence cannot disprove the simple proposition that for a long term of years our property has diminished in value, while our liabilities make greater demands than are named in the stipulation. The honest dollar is the dollar of the contract. We stand ready to endure the due and forfeit of our bond-no more, no less. "If you deny it fie upon your law." Therefore we have assembled in the assured conviction of the ultimate and I believe the immediate triumph of the people's cause. To doubt it is to impeach the intelligence of the American people. To deny it is to question the justice of the Great Creator. Therefore I present to you no Moses to lead the people forty years in the wilderness,

but a gifted young Joshua who shall bid the golden sun and the silver moon stand still while he fights the battle of human freedom.

The nation cried out in her hour of peril and the West gave her Abraham Lincoln:

The land that loves him guards his rest,
The West, the West, the Rowdy West.

Again the nation calls and the West gives her a man sprung from the same soil, inspired by the same motives, loved by the same neighbors, and blessed we fondly believe by the same God. He is by ancestry, birth, education and experience, instinctively and distinctively an American—the very flower of the nation's purest life.

Civilization oscillates like a pendulum, from Solon the law-giver to Alexander the Conqueror, from wolf-nursed Romulus to Imperial Caesar, from Alfred the Liberator to Charles the Tyrant, from Charles Martel who saved, to Louis Capet who squandered Christendom, from Oliver Cromwell to George the Third, from George Washington to Jefferson Davis, from Abraham Lincoln to Grover Cleveland. At the termination of each oscillation, at the close of each epoch, there stands a Demosthenes, a Brutus, a John Hampden, a Mirabeau, a Patrick Henry or a John Brown of Kansas. The pendulum of human liberty has reached the end of the arc. We are at the conclusion of an epoch. The hour has come, the man appeared, the hero has been found. Worthy to stand by Demosthenes and Brutus and Hampden and Mirabeau and Henry and Brown is this most typical product of our Western civilization. Him I name to you for your suffrages for the highest office within the gift of the American Republic-William J. Bryan of Nebraska.

The nomination was seconded by Hon. L. C. Pace of Nebraska, Messrs. McGinley of Michigan, Basher of Iowa, Turner of Ohio, Baker of California, Wedderburn of Virginia, Doniphan of Missouri, McBride of Washington, Towne of Minnesota, Clarno of Oregon, and Mrs. Stansberry of Colorado. No other name being placed before the convention, the nomination was made by acclamation.

The convention then proceeded to the nomination of a candidate for Vice-President, but no speeches were delivered. Mr. Alexander Troop, of Connecticut, presented the name of Hon. Arthur Sewall, of Maine; the nomination was seconded by Mr. H. T. Niles, of Ohio. Mr. Sewall was made the nominee by acclamation.

In mentioning those who participated in the Silver Convention, I have been compelled to rely upon newspaper accounts of the convention and, therefore, much to my regret, have been sometimes unable to give the initials of persons referred to.

T

CHAPTER XV.

THE POPULIST CONVENTION.

HE Populist National Convention met in St. Louis on the 22d of July, 1896. As in the case of the convention of the National Silver party, I am compelled to rely upon the newspaper reports, and, therefore, am unable to give the full names of all to whom I refer as taking part in the proceedings. Senator Marion Butler, of North Carolina, one of the recognized leaders of the Populist party, was elected temporary chairman, and, in taking the chair, said:

Mr. Butler's Speech.

Fellow Citizens: All history teaches that there come great crises in the affairs of men. And all history teaches that humanity is blest and raised to a high level or temporarily cursed, according as the men upon whose shoulders rest the responsibility are able to meet the crisis with wisdom and patriotism and to use it for the betterment of humanity. Two political parties have held national conventions this year. Both have had their say, made their promises, and put forward their leaders.

Another political party, young, but a growing giant in strength, has assembled to speak to the American people at this important and critical hour. We are here because there is need for us to be here. The two parties that have already spoken have between them had charge of the machinery of a great representative government, in which kind of government there are the greatest possibilities for good and for evil the kind of government where the prosperity of the people or their misery can be affected to the greatest degree. The two parties have between them had charge of your government for over thirty years, and during that time a great and prosperous people, a people laboring to carry out the injunction to make two blades of grass grow where one grew before, have performed their duty in the eyes of God and man, and have made this country blossom like a rose, as far as creating wealth was concerned, yet during this time of unexampled creation of wealth, of unexampled industry and economy on the part of the people, these two parties have succeeded in impoverishing the people, have succeeded in wringing the wealth from the hands of those who created it, and transferring it into the pockets of those who neither toil nor spin, have succeeded in bringing this great nation to the verge of ruin.

Did they know better, or did they not know better? Were they honestly mistaken, or did they do it on purpose? In either event their leadership is a discredit to the existence of the party and the necessity of this organization is proven. Every candidate put before the American people since the war by both of these parties has been a man whose nomination and election have carried joy to the hearts of aggregated capital and combined greed. They have

selected the men who have stood in touch with, and been the allied agents of, the powers that have brought this country to the verge of bankruptcy, and these powers, which have destroyed every republic in the past, will destroy this one unless checked. My friends, these two great parties, under false leadership, have during this period succeeded in keeping from the people the greatest issue in American politics; they have managed to array the great masses of the American voters with frenzied zeal on two sides of great national campaigns, when the issue was a sham put up for the purpose of dividing the people. It made no difference which side won, the people lost.

Wall street in the United States, and Lombard street in England, won. While these things were going on the great American heart was wrapped in party prejudice. It was not until they had awakened from this condition and aroused themselves that they began to think upon these questions. Then it was that the great middle classes began to put their heads together for their common good; and when that small cloud appeared upon the horizon, the hearts of the people of the country went forth, and the light of this doctrine spread throughout the land. It was at that time that God raised up a Moses to lead us out of the land of darkness. It was then that Col. L. L. Polk came to the rescue, and with that foresight and wisdom that seem to have been prompted by Providence, he foresaw that, unless sectional feeling engendered by the issues of the war could be allayed, no progress could be made. He foresaw that as long as the people were arrayed against each other by passion and prejudice, so long would the enemies of mankind combine to use the terrible weapon of sectional prejudice to the detriment of the people and destroy their prosperity and property. Then it was that that grand patriot left his home and gave his life to his country. Then it was that he went with a message to the North and to the East and to the West; then it was that he came back to the South with a message from ou Northern friends.

At this hour there stands at Raleigh an enduring monument; and the proud est inscription to be put on that monument will be, “Here lies the man who broke down Mason and Dixon's line."

My friends, the minute that all bitterness is laid aside and the hearts of the people beat as one, that very minute the American people begin to act for themselves. Then it was that the people of the South and West who had been trodden into the dust and loaded with great burdens knew that their interests were the same as those of their fellow-sufferers of the North and the East. That very moment they placed themselves upon the same platform of principles founded by Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. In 1892 we went down to defeat, but our principles grew and flourished because they could not be trampled down. They are right, they are eternal; and from that hour to this they have continued to grow throughout this broad land.

A few weeks ago the great Republican party met in this city. The politicians again wanted to straddle the greatest issue that was before the people, but the People's party had exposed their straddling treachery. The logic of events forced them to express themselves clearly upon the great question of the day, and consequently they went over, bag and baggage, to the great money kings of Wall street and of Europe.