Birmingham state herald. (Birmingham, Ala.) 1895-1897, 1896-09-20
HE THREW HIS COAT AROUND BRYAN
And Bare-Sleeved Stood in the
Pelting Storm.
A RUGGED KNIGHT OF TOLL
The Pride Of the People in the Shadow
Of the Capitol
CRIED ALOUD AND SPARED NOT
The Elements Were Unrendly the Next President,
but Gould Not O. of lis Utter
ances-New Lines of Thought.


a man from all further care is destruct-
i've of the highest forms of citizenship
and Is not to be tolerated in a country
like ours.
Help From the Enemy.
Our opponents are doing as much for
us in this campaign as we are able to
do for ourselves. Gaughter) OF all the
pubic documents recently issued the
most important one Is the letter just
given to the public, written by the secre-
tary of the treasury, from which / de-
sire to quote one sentence: 1T is the duty
of the secretary of the treasury and of
all other public officials to execute in
good faith the policy declared by con-
gress. And'-mark these Words-and
whenever he shall be satisfied that the
silver dollar cannot be kept equal in the
purchasing power with the gold dollar,
except in receiving 1t in exchange for
the gold dollar when such exchange is
demanded it will be his duty to adopt
that course l want you to mark these
words, because in those words the secre-
tary of the treasury tells you that when
ever the secretary is satisfied that it is
necessary that he.will commence redeem
ing silver dollars in gold. daughter)
l call your attention to it because / want
to emphasize the deceptions which have
been practiced by this administration on
the money question (Applause.) When
this administration advised the repeal
of the Sherman law you were told the
repeal of the Sherman law would remove
the difficulty, and yet as soon as the
Sherman law was repealed the same au-
thority which promised relief as soon as
that was repealed came to congress with
the demand that the greenbacks and
treasury notes must be retired by an is
sue of gold bonds in order to stop the
drain on the treasury's gold.'
Proceeding with his speech, after a
brief intermission by violent gust of
wind, Mr.. Bryan said:
THE secretary of the treasury informs
you that If the greenbacks and treasury
notes were all retired so that there would
not be a dollar of paper money to be pre-
sented for gold, yet it would be his duty
TO commence to redeem the silver dol
lars In gold and to start another endless
chain that would drain the treasury.
According to the doctrine laid down by
Mr.. Carlisle you cannot stop the drain
upon the treasury until you retire all the
silver dollars and leave nothing but gold
in the treasury vaults. / am glad that
our opponents are thus compelled to ex-
pose to the public eye their
Heartless, Mercless and Criminal Policy.
I am glad that they have told the public
we must have gold alone and thus have
confessed that we are in the hands of
two banking syndicates and must pay
them what they want. Talk about mo-
nopolies and trusts and here they pro-
pose to establish the most gigantic trust
"a money trust and let the men who
own the gold dole 1t out to the 10000, 900
of American citizens. / denounce that
policy as more cruel and heartless than
would be the domination of any foreign
power. / would rather as has been said,
put an army in the hands of foreign
general or our navy in command of
foreign admiral than put the treasury
department in the hands of q secretary
wi n would
(Cheers) I would resist such financial
policy with as much earnestness as l
would the progressive and invading
army. (Cheers)
"Once when Mr.. Lincoln was candi-
date for Office some one said to him. 1
hope the Lord is on your side and ne re-
piled that he was more anxious to be on
the Lords side. daughter and applause)
! am glad that in this campaign we have
so many evidences that an overruling
prov idence Is ON our SIDE and in no one
instance that 1 know of Is that overrul-
ing providence so distinctly and clearly
manifested as in the recent letter OF the
secretary of the treasury. Let me ask
you a question: Did the administration,
when it recommended the repeal of the
Sherman law. believe it would cure our
troubles? (Cries of "Nor' and cheers.)
II 1t did, then the administration was so
absolutly mistaken that you have the
right to disregard and distrust the knowl-
edge OF tne d0m1DlStfdtlOH Oii tiiS queS-
ton. If the administration knew that The
repeal of the Sherman law would not
bring relief, then you have the right to
tiistrust the honesty of the admin.stra-
ton which would thus recommend one
policy and pursue another" Applause)
An Act OF nightly Courtesy.
Here the threatening clouds began to
discharge their contents upon the audi
ence and the bunting shed its colors upon
the spectators on the PLATFORM dyeing
them red and blue Unfortunately. A
forest of umbrellas arose in the audience,
and one spectator, emulating Sir Walter
Raleigh, took off his coat and threw it
about Mr.. Bryan's shoulders, standing
himself in bare sleeves in the pelting rain.
This elected cheers from the crowd, but
nevertheless the grounds began rapidly
to be divested of spectators.
Shouts were raised for Mr.. Bryan to
go on, and disregarding all the incon-
yeniences, he continued: IF the admin
istration knew when it recommended the
retirement of the greenbacks and treas
ury notes as a means of stopping the
drain on the gold of the treasury that
after they were retired policy would
be proposed such as the secretary now
recommends, 1t was dishonest in not taxi
ing the people into its confidence at the
time fCheers) If 1t did not know that,
then let 1t confess it's ignorance Of f1nan-
ces and of the laws of the country. Does
the administration know now that when
II starts to redeem the silver dollars in
gold 1t will start another endless chain
which will drain the treasury-an endless
chain which will continue until they re-
tire all the silver dollars and substitute
bonds in their place? (Applause.)
"Now, don't think my language IL
harsh. (Here voice in the crowd shout