The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1896-07-03
Bland Stops Working in the
Field to Talk Silver.
HE MAKES THE ISSUE CLEAR
Lucid Statement of Position OF
the Silver Men.
SAYS GOLD MEANS BANKRUPTCY
He Doesn't Want to Be President but
He is Sure the Cause He Has
Fought for so Long
Will Win.

Lebanon. MO-, June oU.-( Speclal II
the World from Staff Correspon
dent.)-Just as l reached Mr.. Bland's
farm this morning the great free sill
YER leader came from his bayfield, coat.
less and with his broad brimmed hat
a-tilt on the back of his massive head
As he stood there in the shade of an
old apple tree he looked the incar-
nation of strength and honesty. A
wide sunlit stretch of the Ozark pla-
teau, cleared by his own hands,
stretched out behind him to a green
rim of scrub oaks on the southern
horizon.
The master of the farm had been
at work since daybreak. From the
distant pasture came the whirr of the
mower and the sound of his sons
voice urging the horses on.
Wh6nI last saw Mr. Bland he was
in the House of Representatives lead
ing the silver men in their last stand
against the bill repaling the purchas-
ing clause of the Sherman act; the
supreme figure in one of the most
remarkable of our Congressional
struggles over the currency.
After serving for twenty-five years
in Congress this remarkable man, de-
feated by the Republican landslide
of 1894, retired patiently and cheer
fully to his 160-acre farm, and sur
rounded by his large family, has
earned his living from the not too gem
erous soil of Southwestern Missouri.
A TYPICAL FARMER CANDIDATE.
1t was an impressive thing to see him
in his working clothes, with the stains
of toll on his hands, and to realize
that State after State was wheeling
into line to support him for the great
est political Office on earth. He seem
ed so simple. SO plain and so uncon-
xcious of his leadership!
Mr. BANDS greeting was hearty and
unaffected. He speaks in a hoarse
voice, and looks straight into your
eyes. There is something of the from
tier clinging to him something of his
old Indian fighting days in Colorado:
and yet his speech is that of scholar
and man of the world-terse, keen,
epigrammatic.
He led the way to his trim. sub
stantial brick house, and presently we
were seated in the little parlor, where
two huge Bibles lay close together
on the table under picture of Pixies
Peak and the Garden of the Gods.
As the leader sprawled in an easy
chair and set his spectacles on the
bridge of his nose, he looked for all
the world like Henry George.
His yellow-haired, four-year-old
daughter, Virginia, strummed violently
on an old-fashioned piano in the rear
of the room and laughed when she saw
that her performance interrupted her
fathers conversation. sweet-faced
matron glided by the door. 1t was
Mrs. Bland.
NOT ANXIOUS TO BE PRESIDENT.
Mr.. Bland talked about the Presidea-
cy and the coming struggle with great
earnestness. He is not consumed by
a desire to be President. His whole
life has been devoted to the free-sil-
yer cause, and now that he sees the
light of what he believes to be the
dawn of new financial era, he is will
ing to lay aside his claims foT those
of any leader acceptable TO the Demo
cratic party.
Letters and kilograms to him have
the country day and night HIS
friends assure him that his nomination
at Chicago is almost certain. But his
pulse is calm. The Western Union
Telegraph Company offered to run a
wire free of cost to his farm, that he
might not be kept in the dark about
what the men who are trying to make
him President are doing in Chicago.
But Mr.. Bland declined, and
answered that he could ride into town
every day for his mail and kilograms
inst as we'll as not, and there the mat
ter ended.
How unlike Mr.. Mckinley, whose II
brarv at Canton was connected by wire
with the room at St. Louis, where
Mark Hanna hourly issued mortgages
on the White House! 1T would take q
page of the World 10 tell how much
Mr.. Bland is unlike Mr.. Mckinley. His
legs have never thrust themselves I'M
der the mahogany of millionaires.
THE FIGHT OF THE PRODUCERS
1.-The present attempt to turn the
Democratic National convention into Z
struggle of the West and South against
the East is founded upon mistaken
idea of the free silver cause" said Mr.
Bland. 1.-THE coming fight at the polls
is to be between the productive masses
of the United Staes, and what NIGH
be called the fund-owning classes"
'.Fhe toilers of the East are just a;
deeply concerned as the toilers OF the
West and South. 1t is no more in the
interest of the men in the Eastern fac
tories to have the agricultural laborer:
Of the nation beaten to the earth by {
ruinous and cruel financial policy thar
it is to the interest of the farmers K
have their fellow workers in the facto
ries reduced to starvation.
"1he workers of the country have
common cause now. / do not believe
they can be divided on geographical
lines"
NOT AFRAID OF THE EAST.
But. surely" | said won have u,
hope taa New York, New Jersey, Con
netticut, Delaware or Maryland vii
remain in the Democratic column if {
fee silver platform is adopted at Chi