34. What It Means                                    

Source:  Kansas Populist (Cherryvale, KS), February 9, 1894

The organizations represented by the ships in the background already were Populist.  The Industrial Legion was founded by Populists.  The Union Labor Party and Alliance were forerunners of the People's Party.  Most Single Taxers in the South and West supported Populism (although their founder, Henry George, did not affiliate with the party).  

In order to promote a larger coalition of reform interests under the Populist banner for the crucial 1896 election, the party's executive committee set the date for the Populist's national nominating convention for late July, after those of the Republican and Democratic parties.  The Republican Party, which was strongest in the nation's Northeast could be expected to endorse the pro-Northeast gold standard.  Populists hoped that this would cause a bolt of western Republicans who they could welcome into their party.  The Democratic Party, Populists believed, would also endorse the gold standard.  The incumbent President was Grover Cleveland, a pro-gold Northeasterner, and the party had a two-thirds rule for nominations that would give pro-gold forces enough strength to force a compromise on the money issue that many southern and western Democrats could not accept.  They also would be ripe for recruitment into the Populist fold after their convention.

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