William Jennings Bryan: Speech to Congress on Tariff Reform

About the Author

William Jennings Bryan was born in Salem, Illinois, in 1860. He graduated at the top of his class in 1883 from Illinois College and earned a law degree from Union College of Law in Chicago two years later. In 1890 he won a surprising victory in a congressional election and became the first Democratic congressional representative in Nebraska history. He served two terms in the House of Representatives by exploiting an alliance with Nebraska Populists and many of their proposals, including tariff reform, a graduated income tax, and, eventually, free silver. His 1892 speech on the tariff in the House of Representatives is an early, though excellent, example of his rhetorical attempt to appeal to rural voters and common folk in economic distress. In 1894 he campaigned actively for the U.S. Senate, but the members of the Republican-dominated Nebraska state legislature chose a candidate from their own ranks despite Bryan's obvious popularity. Not surprisingly, he remained an impassioned supporter of direct election of U.S. senators until the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment made it the law.

Although Bryan never held elective office again, he ran unsuccessfully as the Democratic nominee for the presidency three times: 1896, 1900, and 1908. The most celebrated and competitive of those candidacies was that of 1896, when he was the nominee of both the Democratic Party and the insurgent Populists (People's Party), who regarded Bryan's endorsement of free silver, a graduated income tax, and tariff reform as an adequate, though somewhat restrained, version of their own views. His “Cross of Gold” Speech from the 1896 Democratic National Convention highlights all three of these issues and their importance to Bryan's political career.

Bryan revolutionized presidential campaigning by being among the first candidates to actively pursue voters through personal appearances at hundreds of rallies. His campaigns were, however, woefully underfunded, and he was seldom able to attract widespread support outside the West and the South. Among his contemporaries, his only peer in campaign style was Theodore Roosevelt, whose personal charisma and oratorical skill rivaled those of the “Great Commoner,” as Bryan was widely known. But he also had a vast network of personal relationships, which he had formed as a wildly popular lecturer and through his magazine, the Commoner.

Bryan was instrumental in changing the nature and appeal of the Democratic Party. Perhaps second only to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Bryan was responsible for repackaging the Democrats as the party of the people instead of the party of urban bosses, eastern business conservatives, and unregenerate southern rebels. Bryan was a master at translating rather complicated economic issues, like free silver and tariff reform, into simplistic slogans and shibboleths with which common people could identify. He was also the most popular spokesperson for a stronger and more intrusive national government dedicated to solving the economic problems of ordinary citizens. Occasionally his politics flirted with agrarian radicalism, as when he championed government ownership of railroads, an issue close to the heart of many farmers, who were convinced that railroad freight rates blatantly discriminated against small shippers. Usually, however, he had a knack for staying close enough to mainstream sentiment to protect his reputation as a simple man of the people. Even after his failed political campaigns, Bryan used his enormous personal popularity to influence the content of Democratic platforms as a persuasive member of the party's platform committee for many years.

Bryan spent the last decade of his life on the fringes of party politics but at the center of controversial social issues like Prohibition and women's suffrage—both of which he supported—and the teaching of evolution in public schools, which he adamantly opposed. Creationism was his last great crusade, which was best symbolized by his 1925 participation in the prosecution of John T. Scopes, who was accused of breaking the Tennessee law against teaching evolutionary theory in public schools. Although Bryan's performance at the Scopes trial is often cited as evidence of closed-minded religious fundamentalism, his rhetorical style of championing ordinary citizens from the heartland against outsiders was remarkably consistent with his lifelong defense of the common man.