The Presidential election of 1896 - Democratic Underground

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Mon Nov-26-07 12:10 PM
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The Presidential election of 1896

Edited on Mon Nov-26-07 12:50 PM by dmesg

Just an historical moment I find interesting and probably relevant to today. Also, the Gilded Age has come up in a few threads I've been in so I wanted to throw in my two cents about this; it may make some of my Ron-Paul-directed comments make more sense since I think he taps into a lot of what Bryan tried to tap into.

Note, incidentally, in this map red represents Democratic and blue represents Republican. Hard to imagine, huh?

The Democratic candidate was William Jennings "Cross of Gold" Bryan, and the Republican candidate was William McKinley.

The nation had just had a financial panic -- a lot of financiers had attempted to finance their investments with variable-interest bonds that had come due, and the market didn't have the liquidity to absorb it (times don't change, do they?). Prior to that had been decades of a "gilded age" in which increasingly powerful corporations had gained enough political power to use the government to crush rivals, organized labor, and international competition; but the panic of 1893 signaled a change in public opinion against unfettered corporate power and specifically against the government aiding corporations like it had been.

It had been a time of conspicuous consumption. New housing developments full of ridiculously large houses were springing up on the outskirts of towns. Wealth had been concentrating at an unprecedented pace. The only actions the government seemed capable of was striking down organized labor and convincing industry to write its own regulations.

Bryan, the pro-farmer and pro-worker Democrat, ended up taking the south, the plains, and the rockies, but it wasn't enough to outweigh McKinley's firm hold on the northeast and midwest.

Despite Bryan's loss, the wind was blowing in his direction. The election inaugurated the so-called "Progressive Era" (this was back when Republicans were the progressives -- Bryant was an unusual Democrat for running as more progressive than the Republican; this was because he finally beat the Grover Cleveland pro-business Democrats in the primary) which changed everything about American business, finance, labor, society, etc. Changes made in this following period include:
1. Women's suffrage
2. Income tax
3. Election of Senators
4. Prohibition

In short, the election inaugurated a time of positive, activist government intervention, because the people were sick of anemic and even counterproductive government action previously.

It also changed a lot of what we think about the parties. This election marked the beginning of the Democratic party as the "more progressive" of the two parties. It also began the change of the idea of "liberal" to mean "populist".

Realigning elections like 1896 often drastically change what the parties stand for. For instance, in 1896 it would be hard to imagine the "wild-eyed, long-haird, radical Kansas Republicans" of 40 years previous, since at that point Kansas Republicans were middle-class, mildly methodist, and socially progressive, something it's nearly impossible to imagine now (or even in 1960).

I wonder, seeing the parties flounder and grasp for a narrative that describes themselves, what the parties will look like after this election...

EDIT: Thanks EstimatedProphet; one day I will remember how to spell Bryan's name right...