James B . Weaver James Baird Weaver ( June 12 , 1833 – February 6 , 1912 ) was a United States politician and member of the United States House of Representatives , representing Iowa as a member of the Greenback Party . He ran for President two times on third party tickets in the late 19th century . An opponent of the gold standard and national banks , he is most famous as the presidential nominee of the People ' s Party ( commonly known as the " Populists " ) in the 1892 election . Biography . Early years . Weaver was born in Dayton , Ohio . He was the fifth child and eldest son of the 13 children of Abram Weaver ( 1804 – 1887 ) and Susan Imlay ( 1807 – 1886 ) . His father was a farmer . His family moved to a farm nine miles north of Cassopolis , Michigan in 1835 . In 1842 , the Weaver family moved to the Iowa Territory to await the opening of new land on May 1 , 1843 , when they established a farm four miles north of Bloomfield , Iowa . Five years later the family moved into town when his father was elected Clerk of District Court . In 1853 , Weaver accompanied his brother - in - law on a cattle drive overland from Bloomfield to Sacramento , California , returning by way of Panama . Upon his return Weaver studied law in Bloomfield then later at the Cincinnati Law School . He established himself as a lawyer in Bloomfield . After reading " Uncle Tom ' s Cabin " by Harriet Beecher Stowe , he became active in the abolitionist movement . During this time Weaver met Clarrisa Vinson ( 1832 – 1913 ) , a native of St . Mary ' s , Ohio , who was a teacher in nearby Keosauqua , Iowa . They married on July 13 , 1858 . After the start of the Union mobilization in the American Civil War , he enlisted as a private in the 2nd Iowa Volunteer Infantry Regiment . In 1861 he received a commission as a lieutenant and fought at the Battle of Fort Donelson , Battle of Shiloh and Second Battle of Corinth . Weaver was promoted from lieutenant to major prior to Corinth and to colonel immediately following the battle . By the end of the war , he had been made brevet brigadier general . Political career . After the war he became active in Iowa politics as a member of the Republican Party . In 1866 he was elected district attorney of the Second Iowa Judicial District . On March 25 , 1867 , he was appointed a federal assessor of internal revenue by President Andrew Johnson . Weaver became increasingly disenchanted with the Republican Party and the presidential administration of Ulysses S . Grant , viewing it as under the control of big business at the expense of farmers and small businessmen . He joined the Greenback Party , which advocated an expanded and flexible national currency based on the use of silver alongside gold , as well as an eight - hour work day , the tax ation of interest from government bonds , and a graduated income tax . He was elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1878 on the Greenback ticket and served in the Forty - sixth Congress from 1879 to 1881 , but in 1880 was nominated for the presidency instead of re - election to Congress . Weaver ran again for Congress in 1882 , but lost to Republican Marsena E . Cutts . He successfully ran again in 1884 and was re - elected in 1886 , serving from 1885 to 1889 . During that period , he served as chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of the Interior from 1885 to 1887 and of the Committee on Patents from 1887 to 1889 . When seeking re - election in 1888 , Weaver was defeated in the general election by Republican John F . Lacey . Later years , death , and legacy . Weaver served as mayor of Colfax , Iowa from 1901 to 1903 . He died in Des Moines , Iowa . The James B . Weaver House in Bloomfield , Iowa is a National Historic Landmark . Presidential candidacies . James B . Weaver was twice a candidate for President of the United States . 1880 . Weaver was a candidate for renomination in 1880 , but he was instead nominated as the presidential candidate of the Greenback Party at its convention in Chicago where he outpolled Pennsylvania congressman Hendrick Bradley Wright . In the 1880 presidential election , he received 314 , 578 votes , compared to 4 , 454 , 416 for Republican James Garfield and 4 , 444 , 952 for Democrat Winfield Hancock . Much of Weaver ' s support came from the Great Plains and rural West , areas where the Farmers ' Alliance was strong . The Greenback Party eventually merged with the Democratic Party in most states , a move that Weaver opposed . 1892 . In 1891 Weaver helped found the People ' s Party , a group commonly known as the " Populists . " In 1892 he was the presidential nominee of the Peoples Party at its convention in Omaha and chose a strategy of forming alliances with African Americans in the South . His policy was not well received by Whites in the South and led to violence and intimidation against black voters . Weaver received such strong support in the West that he become the only third - party nominee between 1860 and 1912 to carry a single state . In one of the better showings by a third - party candidate in U . S . history , Weaver received over a million popular votes , and won four states ( Colorado , Kansas , Idaho , and Nevada ) and 22 electoral votes . Weaver also performed well in the South as he won counties in Alabama , Georgia , Mississippi , North Carolina , and Texas . Populists did best in Alabama , where electoral fraud probably carried the day for Democrats . Weaver ' s running mate was James G . Field , a former Confederate general from Virginia whom he selected in an effort to move beyond the era ' s prevailing bloody shirt politics . Work with the 1896 election . In the 1896 election , he threw his support behind Democrat William Jennings Bryan , who supported many of the Populist causes and who subsequently captured the Democratic Party nomination . Weaver had believed that he had struck a deal with Bryan that Tom Watson , who had helped found the Populist Party with Weaver , would be Bryan ' s running mate . Instead Bryan chose Arthur Sewall , a conservative opponent of trade unions from Maine . As a consequence , many in the Populist Party turned against Bryan and refused to support him in the general election . Bryan was defeated by Republican nominee William McKinley . The People ' s Party went into decline after 1896 and soon disappeared ; however , many of its core ideas , such as the direct election of United States Senators , a graduated income tax , and the relaxation of the gold standard , were implemented in later decades , the first two by means of the necessary constitutional amendments . External links . 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