29 October 2007
Nebraska Statesman Revitalized Democratic Party After Civil War
William Jennings Bryan: Attorney, editor, three-time presidential candidate
Washington -- William Jennings Bryan, an Illinois-born Nebraskan, is widely credited with forging a new Democratic Party in the aftermath of the U.S. Civil War.
Bryan discovered Nebraska while visiting a law school friend in its capital, Lincoln, and recognized the prairie state as a land of opportunity. Three years after setting up a law practice in Lincoln, Bryan ran for the House of Representatives as a Democrat -- a longshot candidate in a state that never had sent a Democrat to Congress. Seeing the financial hardships Nebraskans faced, Bryan wove populist political themes into his campaign and won the election. In 1891, he began serving the first of two terms in the House.
In 1894, after Bryan ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate, he became the editor of the Omaha World-Herald, where his articles kept his name and ideas before the public. Through writings and public appearances, Bryan became one of the leading U.S. advocates for the "free silver" policy, a political movement that supported the issuance of paper money backed by silver.
During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln issued paper money, rather than gold coins, for the first time in U.S. history to put more money into circulation. The policy helped pay for the war but stimulated inflation. To counter inflation, national Republican leaders imposed a tight money policy that required every paper dollar issued to be backed with gold. During the economic depressions in Nebraska and other agricultural states in the 1890s, the tight money policy made it more difficult for borrowers to repay loans to Eastern banks. Proponents of free silver maintained backing paper money with more plentiful silver rather than gold would put more currency into circulation and make it easier for debtors to repay loans and keep banks from seizing farms.
Free silver was the central debate during the 1896 Democratic National Convention at which Bryan was a main speaker. His stirring address closed with righteous indignation: "You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold." The crowd responded with more than 30 minutes of applause, and Bryan secured the Democratic presidential nomination.
Bryan’s Republican opponent, William McKinley, ran a "front porch" campaign, staying at home while supporters came to him. Bryan traveled more than 28,800 kilometers and gave more than 600 speeches -- sometimes as many as 20 speeches in a day. But the better-financed Republicans prevailed; McKinley got 51 percent of the vote to Bryan's 47 percent.
When the United States entered the Spanish-American War, Bryan raised a regiment of Nebraska volunteers, but McKinley forced the regiment to sit out the war in Florida. In 1900, Bryan again was the Democratic nominee and again was defeated by McKinley. Again, Bryan turned to journalism, publishing The Commoner from Lincoln, a 16-page weekly paper mailed to 140,000 supporters.
Although not the Democratic nominee in 1904, Bryan ran again in 1908 against William Taft in the first presidential election to use candidates’ recorded campaign speeches. Enterprising phonograph dealers staged "phonograph debates" with mannequins as stand-ins for Bryan and Taft. Despite his considerable oratorical skills, Bryan lost the 1908 election.
FROM PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE TO SECRETARY OF STATE
In 1912, Bryan supported Democrat Woodrow Wilson for the presidency, and the victorious Wilson named Bryan secretary of state -- a position he held for two years. After World War I, Bryan became a vocal advocate for alcohol prohibition and women's suffrage and helped ensure both became the law of the land.
In old age, Bryan was deeply concerned with religious issues. He became even more famous for his unsuccessful prosecution of the "Scopes monkey trial," which pitted traditional interpretation of the Bible against the emerging scientific theory of evolution. Five days after the trial ended, Bryan died in his sleep.
A progressive politician, Bryan was ahead of his time in many ways. Many ideas from his unsuccessful 1896 campaign became part of Republican Teddy Roosevelt's 1904 presidential platform. Bryan also supported the Federal Reserve Act, creation of the Federal Trade Commission, restrictions on trusts and monopolies, government control of currency and banking, voting reform and regulation of campaign contributions.
Bryan helped change the Democratic Party from a conservative party of those defeated in the Civil War to a progressive alliance of small businesses, farmers, blacks and blue-collar workers -- the alliance that later elected Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy.
