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 818-1/2 votes to 105-1/2. A
separate vote was also had on the financial plank as reported by the
majority, and it was adopted by 812-1/2 to 110-1/2. 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: