What Was Something That Happened That Will Never Happen Again in the 1896 Election

Equally the presidential ballot year of 1896 began, things were looking rosy for the Republicans. But the emergence of a brash, young politician, William Jennings Bryan, soon turned the tide. Bryan's campaign laid bare the diverging interests of those whose livelihoods were linked to urban institutions and those who lived by the land in rural America.

With the nation mired in the aftermath of a serious economic depression and a deeply unpopular Democrat incumbent—Grover Cleveland—in the White House, the GOP had surged back in the most recent midterms to win control of both the House and Senate. Governor William McKinley of Ohio easily won the Republican presidential nomination, and seemed poised for a smooth ride to the White House on his platform of economic protectionism and back up for the gilt standard, which defined the value of the nation's currency in terms of how much gold it had in reserve.

But in an unexpected turn of events, the immature Democratic Nebraska lawyer and former congressman Bryan challenged McKinley in 1896. Bryan'south appeal to America's farmers and the working course, his passionate support of the free silver movement and his powerful speaking style galvanized both disaffected Democrats and members of the People'due south (or Populist) Party, turning the election into one of the most hard-fought and consequential in the nation'south history.

READ More: Populism in the United states of america: A Timeline

Backdrop: Panic of 1893

The battle between McKinley and Bryan took place during an economic downturn that had begun in 1893, when 2 of the nation's biggest employers, the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad and the National Cordage Company, collapsed, setting off a stock market panic. Thousands of businesses airtight, and the nation suffered more than than 10 percentage unemployment for more than 5 directly years.

While President Cleveland favored the gold standard, many in the Populist Party and the rural, agrestal wing of the Democratic Party—including many farmers in the South and Due west—supported the Free Silverish Movement. Rather than rely on gold to back the nation'southward money supply, they believed the country should use silver, which was much more arable at the time. This would inflate the currency, increasing the prices farmers would receive for their crops and helping them pay back their debts more easily.

READ More than: How the Gilt Standard Contributed to the Groovy Depression

William Jennings Bryan and the 'Cross of Gold'

William Jennings Bryan was a dominant force in the populist wing of the Democratic political party in 1896.

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When the Democrats convened in Chicago to choose their presidential candidate in July 1896, they repudiated Cleveland and inverse courses dramatically, making free argent a central plank of their platform. At 36 years old, with two terms in Congress and a failed 1894 run for Senate under his belt, Bryan was the party's nigh outspoken and effective champion of silvery. During the convention, he delivered what would become 1 of the most famous political orations in U.Due south. history, known as the "Cross of Gilt" oral communication.

Bryan's eloquent telephone call for an end to government favoritism toward business organization interests and the wealthy at the expense of farmers and the working grade, and his defence force of agrarian democracy against a backdrop of the nation'south growing urbanization, would resonate for generations to come up. The virtually electrical moment of his speech came at the cease, when he drew on his evangelical Christian faith.

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"We will answer their demand for a gold standard by saying to them: You shall not printing down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns," he cried, placing an imaginary crown on his head. "Y'all shall non crucify mankind upon a cross of gold."

The crowd of more than 20,000 at the Chicago Coliseum went wild, and Bryan went on to clinch the nomination, becoming the youngest presidential nominee in history. The Populists, who had won several states in the 1892 election, also nominated Bryan, who shared their gratuitous silver views.

Scout: America's Book of Secrets: The Gold Conspiracy

Bryan's Barnstorming vs. McKinley'south Front Porch

William McKinley, the 25th President of the United States, on the porch of his home in Canton, Ohio. During the 1896 election, McKinley campaigned from his porch while his opponent, William Jennings Bryan, toured the country.

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Bryan traveled near xx,000 miles past rails around the country during his entrada and gave hundreds of speeches, frequently out of the back of his railroad machine. Huge crowds greeted him, drawn by his oratorical skills and the passion he inspired in his supporters.

For his part, McKinley stayed domicile in Canton, Ohio, addressing large delegations of Republican supporters from his front end porch. His campaign mastermind, Cleveland businessman Marking Hanna, attracted 750,000 people to Canton during the entrada and enlisted thousands of speakers to stump elsewhere on McKinley'due south behalf. Foreshadowing a new style of campaign financing, Hanna solicited major contributions from fellow industrialists, raising some $4 million in total.

In the end, despite Bryan's best efforts, his campaign failed to broaden its support beyond its Populist, agrarian Autonomous base. More bourgeois Democrats, who favored the gilded standard, split from the party to nominate their ain National (Gold) Democratic candidate, or even threw their support to McKinley. Republicans managed to attract some urban progressive voters by attacking Bryan as a religious fanatic, in addition to painting a dire motion picture of what abandoning the gold standard would mean for the economy.

McKinley's Decisive Victory

On Election Day, voter turnout topped 79 per centum, reflecting the high stakes of the competition. McKinley won some 600,000 more popular votes than Bryan, the widest margin since 1872, while his win in the electoral college (271 to 176) was fifty-fifty more decisive. In improver to his core back up in the urban Northeast, McKinley gained strength from prosperous Midwestern farmers, industrial workers, and many ethnic voters. For his part, Bryan swept nearly of the South, the only region of the country where the economy remained predominantly agricultural; he besides did well amid farmers in the W and Midwest.

Similar the elections of 1800, 1860 and 1932, the presidential election of 1896 marked a cardinal shift in American politics, and the emergence of a new political reality to reflect the nation'south changed circumstances. McKinley'due south win began an era of Republican dominance, and economical prosperity, that would last for about four decades. It also spelled the offset of the end for the Populist Party, which didn't dissolve entirely but would never regain its former level of success.

Maybe most importantly, the 1896 election marked the decisive triumph of the nation's urban interests—banking, manufacturing and manufacture—over its agrestal past. With Americans migrating to cities at a rapidly increasing rate in the last decade of the 19th century, Bryan would be the last candidate to run past appealing exclusively to the country's rural population.

Bryan ran for president and lose twice more than, in 1900 and 1908, earlier serving as secretary of country under Woodrow Wilson, the era'south merely Democratic president. Just before his death, the man many called "the Dandy Commoner" employed his oratorical skills i concluding time, arguing against the educational activity of evolution in the Scopes Trial.

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Source: https://www.history.com/news/rural-urban-divide-1896-election

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