the
payment of all debts, public and private. The price of silver
as compared with that of gold had been constantly falling
for several years past. This was attributed to the effect
of the legislation which demonetized silver except to a limited
amount. Several eminent Republicans, both in the Senate and
in the House, as well as many others in private station, left
the Republican Party on that issue. Several States that had
been constantly and reliably Republican became Democratic
or Populist, under the same influence.

The Democratic Platform of 1896 demanded the immediate restoration
of the free coinage of gold and silver at the present ratio
of 16 to 1, without waiting for the consent of any other nation.
That doctrine was reaffirmed and endorsed in the Democratic
National Platform for 1900.

There were two theories among the persons who desired to maintain
the gold standard. One was entertained by the persons known
as Gold Monometallists. They insisted that no value could
be given to any commodity by legislation. They said that
nothing could restore silver to its old value as compared
with gold; that its fall was owing to natural causes, chiefly
to the increased production. They insisted that every attempt
to restore silver to its old place would be futile, and that
the promise to make the attempt, under any circumstances,
was juggling with the people, from which nothing but disaster
and shame would follow. They justly maintained that, if we
undertook the unlimited coinage of silver, and to make it
legal tender, under the inevitable law long ago announced
by Gresham, the cheaper metal, silver, would flow into the
country where it would have a larger value for the purpose
of paying debts, and that gold, the more precious metal, would
desert the country where there would be no use found for it
as long as the cheaper metal would perform its function according
to law. From this, it was claimed, would follow the making
of silver the exclusive basis of all commercial transactions;
the disturbance of our commercial relations with other countries,
and the establishment of a standard of value which would fluctuate
and shrink as the value of silver fluctuated and shrunk. So
that no man who contracted a debt on time could tell what
would be the value of the coin he would be compelled to pay
when his debt became due, and all business on earth would
become gambling. They, therefore, demanded that the Republican