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Donald Trump, William Jennings Bryan And The IgnoredThomas Del Beccaro?, ?CONTRIBUTOR, FORBES Magazine, AUG 26, 2015 The political world is abuzz with the comments by and about Donald Trump.? Why he is the talk of towns, large and small, is the subject of many analyses.? If we put it in perspective, the reason becomes quite obvious: Trump’s appeal is a loud and defiant voice for those who feel unheard and more often ignored.Donald Trump is having his say.? Day after day, Trump breaks protocol and lances some issue or politician.? Often he does it with abandon and rarely with kid gloves.? The Left and some on the Right vilify him – while his followers exalt him.At this point, Trump is preferred by as many as 30% of Republicans. Overall, Republicans represent less than 40% of the American electorate.? That means the polls showing Trump’s Republican appeal represent between?10 to 15 percent of the electorate.? To be sure, Independents and Democrats are beginning to support him as well.? But at this early stage, Trump’s appeal, while quite significant, is not yet overwhelming.The question is why.? Why so much interest in a non-politician that speaks too candidly by current standards?Over a hundred years ago, during The Gilded Age, Democrat William Jennings Bryan stirred real emotion as well.? Bryan scared the establishment of the day – far more than Trump is now.? Long before campaign finance laws were around, Bryan scared the establishment so much that the titans of industry, Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan and Henry Frick each put up $250,000 – a stunning and unprecedented amount of money at the time – to support his rival, the establishment candidate William McKinley.Although McKinley won, Bryan’s populist message swept the nation as he championed the issue of debtors who demanded that the government make use of paper money – not limit our currency to gold – so they could pay their debts.? The issue over the nature of our currency had gone unresolved for decades.? The issue divided Republicans and Democrats within their parties and between the parties for decades and voter frustration over the issue mounted as the 1800s came to a close. According to Kevin Phillips, in his biography of William McKinley, from 1873 to 1900, “no American issue throbbed more deeply” than the currency issue.In a speech for the ages, Bryan famously blustered:“If they dare to come out in the open field and defend the gold standard as a good thing, we shall fight them to the uttermost, having behind us the producing masses of the nation and the world.? Having behind us the commercial interests and the laboring interests and all the toiling masses, we shall answer their demands for a gold standard by saying to them, you shall not press down upon ?the brow of labor this crown of thorns.?You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.”Throughout the campaign, Bryan drew a vibrant distinction of two Americas and made the 1896 election the first to have class warfare be its central theme.? Today, the rhetoric of many a Democrat can be traced almost to the exact words of Bryan’s?Cross of Gold?Speech.In Bryan’s time, the voters of the West and South, many of whom were saddled with debt, often to Eastern based banks, found in Bryan a voice for their previously unrequited angst. Bryan nearly rode the angst of those unheard to the presidency.In 2010, the unheard took the form of the Tea Party. According to Scott Rasmussen and Doug Shoen, in their book,?Mad as Hell: How the Tea Party Movement is Fundamentally Remaking Our Two-Party System, the Tea Party was comprised of “concerned American citizens demanding to be heard by an out-of-touch political establishment.”In the years since then, despite several Republican election victories, it could hardly be said that they believe they have been heard.? Indeed, despite the Republican take over of Congress, satisfaction with Republican leadership in Congress has hardly improved.? More often than not, Republican leaders are criticized for not fulfilling their promises – let alone solving the issues of immigration or healthcare. Nor can it be said, by any stretch, that the Democrats in Washington have done so. To the contrary, gridlock on the immigration issue has been part of their political game plan.With all of that in mind, remember that the rise of a third party is often tied to the failure of the major parties to act on an issue of the day.? The Republican Party was born of the failure of the Democrats and the Whig Party to correct the wrong of slavery.? The Greenback Party arose amidst the failure of the Republicans and Democrats to resolve the currency issue.All of which returns us to Donald Trump.? Trump is not in government.? He is in the private sector. He is actually used to people jumping when he demands they do so. With that comes Trump’s fearless comments – even about nearly taboo issues.Trump, however, along with Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina, who also are outside of government and doing well, are less than half the story.? The greater portion of the story is why there is such a receptive voice. The reason is quite simple: our unresponsive governments that ignore voter concerns, if not the good of the nation.As Will and Ariel Durant described it, the “great man . . . grows out of his time and land, and is the product and symbol of events as well as their agent and voice; without some situation requiring a new response his new ideas would be untimely and impracticable.” Is Trump one of those men?? Perhaps.? Even if he is not, what is clear is now is one of those times – and in a very real way, it is the establishment through its inaction that opened the door for a Donald Trump?as they did for Bryan more than a century ago. Their continued inaction widens the door further.So, in this Divided Era of ours, we find that there are more than enough who want to hear a fearless voice – even one subject to hyperbole.? Over one hundred years ago, one such voice nearly became president. It should be no surprise that a double-digit percentage of Americans do so today.? The only question is whether those voices will coalesce into a majority on Election Day. ................
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