"Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: It gratifies me much to find in the capital city
of this great state so marked an evidence of interest which people are taking in this campaign. I do
not come to instruct on the subject of finance. It would be a useless task to add anything to that
which has already been said by the distinguished senator who has brought to the investigation of the
money question that ability which he carried into all his work and will address to ability eloquence
to present and to eloquence a magnificent courage to defend democracy as it is taught by the
fathers. [Appears to be error.] (Applause.) To such a state represented by John W. Daniel (applause)
no apostle of bimetallism need come to aid in the work of education. I am not here as a campaigner.
I am simply passing through the state, because I would never have come to Virginia with any though
that my presence here was necessary to secure the electoral vote of this sate. (Applause.)
I am the nominee of three conventions but I do not appeal to the voter on the ground
that I was nominated by his party. I have a higher claim to your suffrages than party ties can give
me. I appeal to you as the only candidate for the presidency who believe the American people can
have a financial policy of their own. (Applause.)
If there is a man who respects party regularity, he cannot complain of the manner of
my nomination. The Democratic convention which met at Chicago represented the voters of the
Democratic party more truly, more completely than any convention which has been held in recent
years. That convention was regularly called by the regular authorities and delegates were chosen in
every state in the regular manner. And, more than that, the issue joined between the friends of free
coinage and its enemies was fought out before the people themselves, the highest tribunal under our
form of government. (Applause.) The voter, not the bosses, ran the Chicago convention, (applause)
and I am proud to be the nominee of the convention which gave expression to the hope, the
aspirations of the common people of the Democratic party. (Cheers.) But with all this claim to
regularity I do not ask a single Democrat to vote for my election if, in his heart, he believes that
my election would injure his country.
How can you tell whether a man is honest when he tells you that the election of the
Chicago ticket would injure his country? I will give you a way to tell. Any man who thinks my
election would injure this country, can prove it in just one way and that is by voting for the
Republican candidate and thus make sure my defeat. (Cheers and applause.) Don't tell us that your
conscience would permit you to vote the Democratic ticket and then vote for a bolting ticket. The
Bible tells us of the man who hid his talent in the earth and who was condemned because he had
neglected to improve his opportunity."
BALLOT SACRED TRUST.
"I want to say to you that the ballot is given to the citizen as a sacred trust to use
according to his judgment and his conscience, and that no man in an hour of peril has a moral right
to throw his vote away. (Cheers.) Why is it that some Democrats or some people who used to be
Democrats spend the day in telling how the election of the Chicago ticket would ruin this country,
and then refuse to cast their votes for the only man who can defeat the Chicago nomination.
(Cheers.) I will tell you why. It is because they have not the courage to bear the odium of being
Republicans. (Great cheering.)
We are engaged in a great struggle, one of the greatest struggles in which the people
of this country were ever engaged in in time of peace. It is a struggle between democracy on the one
side and plutocracy on the other and there is no middle ground for any man to stand upon. (Loud
cheering.) Those who are not for us, are against us. We would have more respect for them than if
they were honest enough to go where they belong. (Cheers.)
I believe we shall win now. But whether we win now or not, we have begun a warfare
against the gold standard which shall continue until the gold standard is driven from our shores
back to England. (Cheers.) We have been opposed to the importation of criminals and paupers from
abroad, and we shall oppose the importation of a financial system which is criminal and which makes
paupers wherever it goes.
The Republican platform adopted at St. Louis declares not that the gold standard is
good but that it must be maintained. How long? Until the American people are tired of it? No, they
are tired of it now. Until the people desire to get rid of it? No, they desire to get rid of it now.
How long? We must maintain it until foreign nations desire us toget rid of it." (Great cheering.)
ON FAMOUS GROUND.
"In this city where Patrick Henry delivered his famous speech which aroused the nation
to arms, I am not afraid that the people will permit a foreign financial control when more than 100
years ago your ancestors were willing to give their lives if need be to release the colonies from
foreign political control. We are in favor of the immediate restoration of free and unlimited
coinage of both gold and silver at the present legal ratio of 16 to 1, without waiting for the aid
or consent of any other nation. (Cheers.)
We are in favor if it because bimetallism is needed to give the people a sufficient
volume of standard money to keep pace with population and business. The treasury reports show a
shrinkage of more than $150,000,000 in the currency of the people within the last two years. The
Republican party does not propose any plan by which any currency shall be replenished from time to
time as the people need money. They simply desire the people to urn over our financial system to a
few syndicates who can profit by the extremities of the government—extremities which the
syndicates have done more to create than any other cause. (Applause.)
We apply the law of supply and demand to money. We say the value of a dollar depends
upon the number of dollars, and that we can raise the value of a dollar by making dollars scarce,
and we charge that our opponents are in favor of making money scarce, because they are controlled by
those who want money to be dear. If you own money, you ought to vote the Republican ticket. If you
are in favor of money the only thing it is desirable to own, a and making property the only thing
that everybody wants to get rid of, you want to vote the Republican ticket, because the Republican
party proposes to continue the present financial system, the object of which it is to make it more
profitable to hoard money and get the increase in the value of a dollar, than to put that dollar to
work employing labor and developing the resources of this great country." (Cheers.)
REASON IN THEIR MADNESS.
You ask why it is anybody in this community can favor a gold standard. I will tell you
why some people in some communities that I know, favor gold standards. I have known merchants who
were notified that unless they supported the gold standard, they could not obtain any extension on
their notes at the banks, and that is brought about by the fact that some banks are notified from
New York that unless they use their influence in favor of a gold standard, they cannot discount
their notes in New York, and the New York banks are notified from London that if we do not have a
financial policy run on the European plan the English money lenders will not let us have money.
(Applause.)
Our opponents tell us that we must maintain the gold standard in order to borrow
money. We reply that if we maintain the gold standard, we will never be able to do anything but
borrow money, and we will soon be at an end in that, because our property will not be fit to borrow
on. (Uproarious applause and cheers.)
They tell s that the election of the Chicago ticket will drive gold from this country.
I want you to remember that the mere nomination of the candidate for president upon the free silver
platform has been bringing gold to this country for the last few weeks. (Cheers.)
My friends, if a nomination will start this much of a flow of gold this way, what will
be the result of the election of a president who is in favor of free silver? (Cheers.)
We are notified that we cannot maintain the parity if Mexico cannot. This nation can
create a demand for silver ten times a great as any demand that can be created in Mexico, and my
friends, if there is a Republican who doubts if this nation is greater than Mexico, let him remember
that the united States and Mexico together may be able to do what Mexico cannot do alone. (Loud
cheers.)
Gold financiers want the gold standard because it is good for their people. The
financier wants the standard, he says, because it is good for the farmer; he wants the gold standard
because it is good for the laborer. He is for it because it is good for the business man. You tell
him that these people are willing to risk bimetallism, and then what does he say? Rising to the full
height of his moral stature, he tells you that he cannot, according to his conscience, allow other
people to hurt themselves, even if they want to hurt themselves. (Laughter and applause.)
When I find a man who is always wanting to help me against my will, who is trying to
do something for me that I don't want; who is always feeling for me, I notice that he doesn't reach
me when he feels for me. (Cheers.) When these advocates of the gold standard asserted that the free
coinage of silver would be good for them, it took a great load off my mind. For twenty years these
people have, according to their say so, been sacrificing themselves for the rest of the people. I
don't believe they should be allowed to further wrong themselves for their good. (Cheers.) And when
these people insisted that the free coinage of silver would be good for them, I thought now our time
has come. We will pay back this debt that has been accruing for twenty years, and we will make them
enjoy the benefits of free coinage all the rest of their natural lives, and we will bear with
fortitude whatever evils come of it. (Laughter and cheers.)
Now, my friends, I must close. (Cries of "Go on, go on.") I have been proving my
loyalty to the ratio of 16 to 1 by working sixteen hours in one day and I cannot go beyond that, my
friends.
I want you to take this question and do what you think best, and whatever is the
result I shall willingly abide by it, whether it be to elect or defeat, conscious that victory must
at last come to all those who fight for the cause of truth." (Great cheering.)