Escanaba, MI Speech, 1896-10-14

Speech by William Jennings Bryan.

Speech by William Jennings Bryan
Wednesday, October 14, 1896 at 4:15pm
City Park, Escanoba, MI

Source: The Evening News, Thursday, October 15, 1896

"Somebody has said that everybody knows more than anybody, and when we get an opinion of a majority of the people, we get as near the opinion of everybody as you can obtain in governments. And in this campaign we are submitting our cause to the judgment of the American people. I have been criticized so many times for traveling around among the people, but, my friends, I do not know where a candidate is going to go if you do not allow him to go among the people who are to vote for him. If a candidate is to meet the people, he must go to them or they must come to him and times are so hard under the gold standard that I had to come to you. I do not think it is undignified for a candidate for office to discuss public questions before those who are to vote. I do not think it is undignified for a man to tell the people what he believes and what he stands for. Candidates stand for policies, and you vote for candidates because you want the policies for which they stand. I stand for an American financial system, for the right of the American people to attend to their own business and I am entitled to the votes of those who believe with me. I believe in bimetallism, and I believe in it so much that I am not going to wait until a gold standard man brings it to me before I have it. I believe that bimetallism is good for the American people, and I believe in it so much I want the American people to get the benefit of it whether foreign nations like it or not."