Free Silver

Examples of Free Silver in the following topics:

• The Economy and the Silver Solution

  • Proponents of "free silver" believed that the United States economy should be based on silver instead of gold.
  • Free Silver was a central American policy issue in the late 19th century.
  • Supporters of Free Silver were called "Silverites".
  • Everyone agreed that free silver would raise prices.
  • Evaluate the reasons for, and consequences of, the adoption of the "free coinage of silver"

• Economic Conditions

  • This angered proponents of the free coinage of silver known as the "Silverites."
  • Free silver advocates wanted the mints to accept silver on the same principle, so that anyone would be able to deposit silver bullion at a Mint and in return receive nearly its weight in silver dollars and other currency.
  • A 1896 Republican poster warns against free silver.
  • They carry out the following conversation: "'What awful poor wages they have in all those free silver countries, John!'
  • We could never buy clothes for the children on what they given in free silver countries, could we?"

• Silverties Versus Goldbugs

  • After the war, the government passed the Fourth Coinage Act in 1873 and soon resumed payments without the free and unlimited coinage of silver.
  • William Jennings Bryan, who took over leadership of the Democratic Party in 1896 as well as the Populist and Silver Republican Parties, demanded bimetallism and "Free Silver. " The Republican Party nominated William McKinley on a platform supporting the gold standard which was favored by financial interests on the east coast.
  • A faction of Republicans from western silver mining regions known as the Silver Republicans endorsed Bryan.
  • This process and the discoveries of large gold deposits in South Africa and Alaska (Witwatersrand Gold Rush of 1887 and the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896) increased the world gold supply and the subsequent increase in money supply that free coinage of silver was supposed to bring.
  • The Silverites advocated free coinage of silver.

• Inadequate Currency

  • In the address, Bryan supported bimetallism or "free silver", which he believed would bring the nation prosperity.
  • To advocates of what became known as free silver, the 1873 act became known as the "Crime of '73".
  • The profit, or seignorage, from monetizing the silver was to be used to purchase more silver bullion.
  • Implementation of the Bland-Allison Act did not end calls for free silver.
  • In his "Cross of Gold" speech, William Jennings Bryan advocated for bimetallism or "free silver", which he believed would bring the nation prosperity.

• The Populist Party and the Election of 1896

  • He gave speeches, organized meetings, and adopted resounding resolutions that eventually culminated in the founding of the American Bimetallic League, which then evolved into the National Bimetallic Union, and finally the National Silver Committee.
  • The ultimate goal of the League was to garner support on a national level for the reinstatement of the coinage of silver.
  • Jones of the St Louis Post-Dispatch was put on the platform committee and Bryan's plank for free silver was adopted sixteen to one, and silently added to the Chicago Democratic Platform in order to avoid controversy.
  • Bryan delivered speeches across the country for free silver from 1894 to 1896, building a grass-roots reputation as a powerful champion of the cause.
  • In a test vote on an anti-silver measure, the Eastern states (from Maryland to Maine), with 28% of the delegates, voted 96% in favor of gold.

• The People's Party and the Election of 1896

  • When the Republicans nominated former Ohio Governor William McKinley for president in June 1896 and passed at his request a platform strongly supporting the gold standard, a number of "Silver Republicans" walked out of the convention.
  • Silver forces were supported by the Democratic National Bimetallic Committee, the umbrella group formed in 1895 to support silver Democrats in their insurgency against Cleveland.
  • In that year's presidential election, the Democrats nominated William Jennings Bryan, who focused (as Populists rarely did) on the free silver issue as a solution to the economic depression and the maldistribution of power.
  • In the address, Bryan supported bimetallism or "free silver," which he believed would bring the nation prosperity.

• Silver

  • The metal occurs naturally in its pure, free form (native silver).
  • Dilute silver nitrate solutions and other silver compounds are used as disinfectants and microbiocides.
  • Silver sulfide also forms silver whiskers when silver electrical contacts are used in an atmosphere rich in hydrogen sulfide.
  • Other dangerously explosive silver compounds are silver azide (AgN3), formed by reaction of silver nitrate with sodium azide (NaN3), and silver acetylide, formed when silver reacts with acetylene gas.
  • Silver cyanide solutions are used in electroplating of silver.

• The Farm Problem and Agrarian Protest Movements

  • The pragmatic portion of the Populist platform focused on issues of land, railroads, and money, including the unlimited coinage of silver.
  • It was the currency question, however, pitting advocates of silver against those who favored gold, that soon overshadowed all other issues.
  • Agrarian spokesmen in the West and South demanded a return to the unlimited coinage of silver.
  • The Democratic Party, which supported silver and free trade, absorbed the remnants of the Populist movement as the presidential elections of 1896 neared.
  • Pleading with the convention not to "crucify mankind on a cross of gold," William Jennings Bryan, the young Nebraskan champion of silver, won the Democrats' presidential nomination.

• Iron, Cobalt, Copper, Nickel, and Zinc

  • Copper is a member of a family of metals known as the "coinage metals," which includes copper, silver, gold, and roentgenium.
  • Copper is the most heavily used of the coinage metals due to its electrical properties, its abundance (compared to silver and gold), and the properties of its brass and bronze alloys.
  • The free element, produced by reductive smelting, is a hard, lustrous, silver-gray metal.

• Ion Separation by Fractional Precipitation

  • Prepare a solution of the unknown salt using distilled water and add a small amount of silver nitrate (AgNO3) solution.
  • Silver chloride (AgCl) is not soluble and forms a white precipitate.
  • In the above reaction, the silver carbonate is used up and the precipitate will disappear.
  • Bromides and iodides also form precipitates when they are reacted with silver nitrate, but both precipitates are pale yellow.
  • Chlorine water frees the bromine and iodine atoms as a gas.