1. Chapter 26 – Part III (pgs. 614-621) Wrap-up of Cleveland’s 2 nd Term & The “Free-Silver” Election of 1896

2. Grover Cleveland’s 2 nd Term ** The Panic of 1893 -The “Revolt of the Debtor” ** The demands of Coxey’s Army: 1) an inflationary public works program supported by $500,000,000 in paper. - took this demand to Washington in 1894.

3. Grover Cleveland’s 2 nd Term: cont. ** The Pullman Strike of 1894  Eugene Debs (American Railway Union – 150,000 members)  1/3 wage cut but rent stayed the same for the company town houses in Chicago.  U.S. Attorney General Richard Olney urges the dispatch of federal troops. Justified this by claiming that strikers were interfering with the transit of the U.S. Mail (Pres. Cleveland agreed)  The troops crushed the strike and Debs was sentenced to 6 months in jail for violating a federal court injunction to end the strike (1 st ever gov’t use of an injunction to stop a strike.)

4. The Free-Silver Election of 1896  Monetary policy, whether to maintain the gold standard or inflate the currency with silver, loomed as the key political issue.  The Candidates: William McKinley (Repub. from Ohio) vs William Jennings Bryan (Dem. from Neb.)

5. William McKinley  Got his financial support from wealthy Ohio businessman Mark Hanna (the “president maker”)  Amassed the largest campaign chest in U.S. history up to that time ($16,000,000)  Was pro-gold & pro-tariff

6. William Jennings Bryan  Young (only 36 yrs. old)  Pro-silver (His platform demanded inflation through the unlimited coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 oz. of silver to 1 oz. of gold even though the market ratio was actually 32 to 1. This meant that $1 in silver was actually only worth 50 cents.) ** This platform absorbed the Populist Party.  Raised a $1,000,000 campaign chest  Delivers the “Cross of Gold Speech” in which he tells McKinley that “you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.”

7. The Results & Significance  Why did most “wage slaves” support McKinley?  McKinley wins 271-176.  The outcome was a resounding victory for big business, big-cities, middle-class values, and financial conservatism.  Bryan’s defeat marked the last serious attempt to win the White House with mostly rural (agrarian) votes. **** The future of presidential politics clearly did not lay on the dwindling farm population, but instead with the rapidly growing cities.

8. Turning the Economic Corner in 1897  Farm prices began to rise.  Industry began to flourish.  Huge gold deposits in Canada’s Klondike region, Alaska, South Africa, & Australia brought about huge supplies of gold onto world markets and along with it, the moderated inflation that debtors had been looking for.