Hot Time in the Old Town - Edward Kohn [2]
Not all Republicans shared such an intense interest in protecting American business. As part of the progressive wing of the Republican Party, Roosevelt had always been more interested in government and urban reform than trade and the money supply. The words “tariff” and “bimetallism” might have been the burning national issues of the various presidential campaigns, but Roosevelt had never been particularly keen on economic issues. Instead, Roosevelt had made his career attacking corruption in New York and had also spent six years as civil service commissioner in Washington, DC, trying to ensure that the government filled its offices based on merit and not political affiliation.
Despite his high ideals, Roosevelt had had a tough going in New York. He always had something of the crusader about him, but by August 1896 one of his crusades had brought him little but scorn in the city of his birth. Attempting to enforce the highly unpopular Sunday Excise Law, mandating that saloons close on the Sabbath, Roosevelt had alienated such important Republican constituencies as New York’s German population, who had switched their votes to New York Democrats in the last election. City and state Republicans blamed Roosevelt and had even tried to legislate the job of president of the Board of Police Commissioners out of existence. In the face of such opposition from his own party, it was fairly clear to Roosevelt that his New York political career was over. By the start of the 1896 campaign, in spite of his differences with McKinley, he was one of many Republicans pinning their hopes on a Republican victory and a new posting in Washington.
As top Republicans descended on New York to plot campaign strategy, the Democratic nominee, William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska, also prepared to visit New York. Fresh from his triumphal “Cross of Gold” speech the month before at the Democratic National Convention, Bryan planned to kick off his campaign in what he called “the enemy’s country.” Bryan’s candidacy reflected the split in the Democratic Party over the money supply—the gold standard versus bimetallism. Yet the debate over monetary policy simply reflected the larger question of who exactly held power in the United States. Farmers wanted a looser money supply so that credit might be attained more easily, while the resulting inflation would mean higher prices for their crops. For these farmers, American business’s hostility to bimetallism reflected agriculture’s marginalization at the hands of the “Money Power.” After all, it was reasoned, banks, railroads, corporations, and even political parties kept their headquarters east of the Mississippi and north of the Mason-Dixon line. Banks set interest rates, railroad companies set freight rates, and the government adopted a laissez-faire attitude that favored these commercial interests at the expense of the American farmer. The playing field had to be leveled, and backing the American dollar with both gold and silver was one answer. Many had their doubts. Republicans almost uniformly rejected bimetallism. In American cities, laborers feared inflation would dilute their pay-checks. Urban Democrats, such as New York’s Tammany Hall political machine, therefore backed the gold standard and viewed Bryan’s candidacy with skepticism if not utter distaste.
Bryan’s trip to New York was supposed to change that. He planned to officially accept his nomination at a huge meeting in Madison Square Garden. He would avoid the drama and biblical imagery of his “Cross of Gold” speech in favor of a careful, reasoned