to be the primary interest of the West. Men were not yet
willing to leave their parties for the sake of silver. The panic drove
them to the final step.

Through the campaign of 1892 the major parties had dodged the issue of
free silver by adopting evasive planks, while the general ignorance
respecting the laws of money prevented the evasion from being seen.
Until 1890 neither organization had been unfavorably disposed towards
free silver and Congressmen catered to the movement when they dared. As
its accomplishment became more probable, the selfish interests that
would be adversely affected, and the economists who saw its theoretical
danger, and the moralists who disliked repudiation, made common cause in
a wide campaign of education.

With the exception of extreme inflationists, all had declared that they
wanted "honest" or "sound" money, and both parties insisted, in 1892,
that all dollars, of whatever sort, must remain equal in value and
interchangeable. They insisted, too, that silver must be used as well as
gold, and neither platform saw that the demands were either inconsistent
or improbable of realization. The pledge of equality pleased the
creditor East, while that of equal use of both metals satisfied the
debtor West and South.

Bimetallism was a cry of many who disliked free silver, yet feared that
a demand for the gold standard would wreck the party. As long as the
traditional ratio of sixteen to one remained the commercial ratio, the
free use of both metals was theoretically possible, but the experience
of the United States showed that a slight variation in the commercial
ratio inevitably drove the more valuable dollar into retirement and left
the cheaper in use. The truth of Gresham's Law was believed by most
economists, who doubted whether the commercial ratio was ever
sufficiently permanent to make bimetallism possible. With the silver
declining rapidly it was out of the question. If the silver in
circulation ever got beyond the power of the government to control it
through redemption in gold nothing could avoid the silver standard. No
law of the United States could prevent it. There was only a bare
possibility that an international agreement always to regard sixteen
ounces of silver as worth one ounce of gold might establish the ratio,
but to this straw the bimetallist turned, trying to ward off the demand
for free silver with his plea for international bimetallism.

[Illustration: The Flood of Silv