Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1896-08-18
Bryan and the Silver Trust.

For some time the charge has been
openly made, III leading Democratic
quarters. that w. }. Bryan had been,
since his retirement from Congress.
in the paid employ Of the Silver
League, au association OF rich silver
mine owners. formed for the purpose
of pushing the free silver movement
in all possible ways. This organiza
tionwouId make millions and millions
of dollars at the expense of the Amer
lean people if the free coinage of sill
Yer should become law. They already
constitute what is undoubtedly the
most powerful trust in the country
No other organization Of capital in tho
country compares with it in the inn
, mense aggregate of wealth it repre-
ScntS. The whole silver movement
/ originated with this immensely rich
combination of mine owners. II was
/ d movement that, from the start. has
I been carefully organized ana backed
! by unlimited money. The mine own
ers have realized from the start that
ii clean additional profit to themselves
of from $30.00O.000 10 $50o0D.00o a
year, at the expense of the rest of
. the country WAS we'll worth striving
for. No detail in their scheme was
deemed too small TO he overlooked.
They organized and have since MAIN
tanned at Washington, at the expense
of hundreds of thousands OF dollars.
the most powerful. the most pcrsis-
tent and the most aggressive lobby
ever known 20 the history of the
American. They have organized IA
bureau that, for the past six years has
Hooded the country with free silver
literature. 1t has employed a small
army of writers to prepare an assert
mcnt of free silver literature for il =.
all of whom have been paid hand
somely for their work. Some of them.
like Harvey who wrote Coins Finau-
cial School" have even grown rich
out of their efforts in behalf of the
Mine Owners Trust But the power
ful silver league has hot stopped here.
It has employed agents. many Of
them bright young lawyers. to repre-
sent It in various parts of the country,
and do missionary work through the
press and on the stump.
Never in the history of this country
has Il giant monopoly, by the liberal
use of its money, been able to get such
grip upon the affairs of our country.
Today. for the sake of the enormous
profits it would secure if successful,
il is pushing to the front the most
bare faced and indcfcnsiblc piece of
/ class legislation this country has ever
known, under the hypocrtical pre-
tcncc that il is in the interests of the
people,
Fortunately the people of this coun-
try are intelligent, and are not to be
caught by the Establishments of the
Rich Mining Trust whose selfish in
tercsts show only too clearly through
the thin veneer of plausibility with
which they seek to disguise their true
motives.
On the 1lth day of last July the
Chicago Chronicle, the leading Demo
cratic daily of the West, stated that
among many who have been EN-
ploycd and carried on the pay rolls of
big bonanzas for a number of years is
VIM. j. Bryan of Nebraska. He is a
paid agent and spokesman for the free
silver combine, and he has not since
his retirement from Congress had any
other visible means of support
Now here was an implicit statement
If it We're false Mr. Bryan certainly
owed it to the public to make
prompt and implicit denial. This de-
NAL he has never made. Certainly he
| would scarcely claim that his fine
home establishment at Lincoln. and
all his personal expenses have been