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The Climax of Populism: the Election of 1896

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The Climax of Populism: the Election of 1896 University of Kentucky UKnowledge American Politics Political Science 1965 The Climax of Populism: The Election of 1896 Robert F. Durden Duke University Click here to let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Thanks to the University of Kentucky Libraries and the University Press of Kentucky, this book is freely available to current faculty, students, and staff at the University of Kentucky. Find other University of Kentucky Books at uknowledge.uky.edu/upk. For more information, please contact UKnowledge at [email protected]. Recommended Citation Durden, Robert F., "The Climax of Populism: The Election of 1896" (1965). American Politics. 10. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_political_science_american_politics/10 The Climax of Populism This page intentionally left blank ROBERT F. DURDEN The Climax of Populism: The Election of 1896 PUBLISHED BY THE UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY PRESS CoPYRIGHT © 1965 by the University of Kentucky Press. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 65-11824. To my mother MILDRED DONALDSON DURDEN and to my late father VIRGIL EDWARD DURDEN who shared and stimulated my first interest in the Populists This page intentionally left blank Preface SELDOM in American history has a third politicai party had such impact on contemporary events and been the object of such continuing interest among historians as the People's party, or Populists, of the 1890's. The colorful characteristics of some of the leaders of the party-largely an agrarian one -are by no means the sole reason for the continuing attention the party receives. Although the flamboyance and eccentricity of a few "Pops" caused conservatives at the time, and some historians since, to ridicule them as provincial cranks, by no means all of the Populist leaders were "sockless," as an enemy dubbed Congressman Jerry Simpson of Kansas. A young Populist leader and United States Senator from North Carolina, Marion Butler, played a central role in the political events of 1896. Although he certainly had a farm background, as did well over half of the American people at the time, Butler was graduated from the University of North Carolina. And he was, like many of his coworkers in the People's party, an educated man of considerable dignity and polish. Not their alleged eccentricities then, but the reform ideas and efforts of the Populists account for their lasting im­ portance. Their demands foreshadowed a considerable part of the achievements of the Progressives and New Dealers in the twentieth century. In their own time, the Populists exerted great influence not only in the southern and western states where they were strongest but also on the political life of the nation as a whole. viii Preface They played a leading role in the rise to ascendancy of the free silver issue and, obliquely, in the revolution within the Democratic party epitomized by the nomination of William Jennings Bryan in 1896. In the campaign that followed, easily the most significant one that the nation had known since 1865, the Populists occupied strategic ground and, mainly, made their greatest national effort for Bryan, whom they also nominated as their presidential candidate, and for the various reforms that free silver symbolized. Despite many studies of different aspects of the "Battle of the Standards" in 1896, confusion and error persist concern­ ing the role of the People's party. According to many his­ torical accounts, the Populists were tricked by wily leaders into nominating Bryan and allegedly expressed their deepest and truest desires only in the nomination of Thomas E. Watson of Georgia as their own vice-presidential candidate. In the accounts of the campaign itself, most historians depict Watson as the ill-treated martyr of Populism who was be­ trayed not only by false Democratic promises but more especially by devious Populist leaders. A quite different perspective on the Populist part in the epochal campaign of 1896 is furnished by the study of a large collection of documents in the Southern Historical Collection of the University of North Carolina Library. These are the papers of Marion Butler, who played a decisive role in the controversial Populist convention in St. Louis and was elected at the conclusion of that meeting as the national chairman of the People's party. Hundreds of letters that came to Chairman Butler from Populists all over the nation during the campaign, together with two thick letterbooks of his outgoing correspondence, afford an inside view and a new understanding of the Populist effort both in the nation and in most of the states where the third party flourished. The two most important studies dealing with the Populists Preface ix in 1896 remain Professor John Hicks' The Populist Revolt, which was first published in 1931, and Professor C. Vann Woodward's Tom Watson: Agrarian Rebel, which appeared in 1938. Professor Hicks' book continues to be the most comprehensive account of the subject, as is evidenced by the fact that it was reprinted in 1961, and is still widely used in libraries and classrooms, including my own. Professor Wood­ ward's biography of Watson has also been recently reissued and has come to be recognized as a classic portrayal of a social class and a section almost as much as a study of its fascinating subject. Tom Watson, it so happens, was the first book in American history about which I remember becoming deeply and personally excited. The Butler papers were not available, however, when these two distinguished historians published their Populist studies, and both portray the Populist con­ vention and the ensuing campaign in a manner quite different from that which follows. The purpose of this book, then, is to show first that the Populists were not tricked into naming Bryan as their candi­ date and that there was no "conspiracy" at the St. Louis convention. Rather, the Populists' nomination of the Ne­ braskan Democrat was not only consistent with their prin­ ciples but was essential if the party was to remain national in scope. In the campaign itself, despite embarrassment caused by Tom Watson, who had allowed himself to be sadly miscast in the political drama, the national leaders of the Populists worked out a largely effective policy of electoral-ticket fusion with the Democrats. And this policy made possible both the preservation of the Populist national and state organizations and the participation by the Populists in the great allied effort for Bryan and national reforms. The year 1896, in short, saw the climax of Populism, the time of its greatest significance in American history. That McKinley and the status quo triumphed over Bryan Preface and reform was not because of any failure of the Populists. They, together with their political allies for silver, concen­ trated their efforts in the campaign on the farmers and industrial workers in the pivotal north central states. And there, through circumstances largely beyond the control of the reform parties, the reformers lost their first great bid for progressive change. Mostly farmers, the Populists were not spokesmen for a static society, nor were they opposing and fleeing from the industrial future of the nation. They sought rather to capture federal power and use it both negatively to end economic abuses that had flourished since the Civil War and positively to improve the lot of the farmers and industrial workers of the land. The Populists failed in 1896-but their failure was by no means ignominious, and in one sense they triumphed at a later day when their reforms were introduced under other auspices and the "Pops" had become but a fading memory. Perhaps two other points should be made here about the intensely human and political story that follows. First, political "spoils" in the form of salaried offices, high and low, did play a large part in the politics of the 1890's, larger perhaps than is true of our own prosperous day. This fact was true of the Populists· just as it was of the Democrats and Republicans, and it did not mean that Americans were then more venal or selfish. The reason was simple: the depression that began in 1893 was merely the lowest point in a deflation­ ary cycle that reached far back into the Gilded Age. In­ credibly low farm prices, unemployment, and grinding poverty made many men desperate for an office-almost any office­ that paid a fixed salary in an era when the dollar grew scarcer as its purchasing power increased. Secondly, the truism that ours is a federal system of politics as well as of government needs repeating in advance. The Populists' struggles to reconcile their conflicting sectional Preface Xl interests with their national organization and policies led to an amazing complexity in the election of 1896. Indeed, the infinite variety of politics in the United States has never been more strikingly demonstrated. The reader who remembers that American political parties are not and have never been primarily concerned about their ideological purity and that they are composed of many state and sectional units rather than being national monoliths will appreciate rather than deplore some of the aspects of the climactic struggle of the Populists. Fortunately, the Research Council of Duke University has patience in good supply. The Council began to assist my summertime research into Populism some ten years ago. When other projects developed and caused long interruptions, the Council raised no objections. It is a pleasure to thank them and particularly the chairman, Professor John Tate Lanning. The most important documents for this study were in the Southern Historical Collection of the University of North Carolina Library, and Dr. James W. Patton, the director of the Collection, and Dr.
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