page_title: Bourbon Democrat
section_title: State histories
hierarchical_section_title: Bourbon Democrat / State histories
caption_attribution_description: Henry M. Mathews. English: Henry Mason Mathews was a former Governor of West Virginia.
context_page_description: Bourbon Democrat was a term used in the United States in the later 19th century to refer to members of the Democratic Party, usually Southern, who were ideologically aligned with conservatism or classical liberalism, especially those who supported presidential candidates Charles O'Conor in 1872, Samuel J. Tilden in 1876, President Grover Cleveland in 1884–1888/1892–1896, and Alton B. Parker in 1904.
  After 1904, the Bourbons faded away. Southerner Woodrow Wilson, who had been a Bourbon, made a deal in 1912 with the leading opponent of the Bourbons, William Jennings Bryan; Bryan endorsed Wilson for the Democratic nomination and Wilson named Bryan Secretary of State. Bourbon Democrats were promoters of a form of laissez-faire capitalism which included opposition to the high-tariff protectionism that the Republicans were then advocating as well as fiscal discipline. They represented business interests, generally supporting the goals of banking and railroads, but opposed to subsidies for them and were unwilling to protect them from competition.
caption: West Virginia Governor Henry Mason Mathews (1834–1884) was the first of the Bourbon Democrats to reach the highest office of state politics[8]
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