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Pirtle Springs in 1895. In the Chicago Convention he received the second largest number of votes for the Presidential nomination, and during the campaign which followed was active in support of the nominees. His name is known among the students of the money question in every civilized nation, and his faithful and continuous labors in behalf of the restoration of bimetallism have given him a warm place in the hearts of his countrymen.
Mr. Weaver was elected to Congress in 1878, and served in the Forty-sixth, Forty-ninth and Fiftieth Congresses. In January, 1880, he introduced the following resolution:
Resolved, That it is the sense of this House that all currency, whether metallic or paper, necessary for the use and convenience of the people, should be issued and its volume controlled by the Government and not by or through banking corporations, and when so issued should be a full legal tender in payment of all debts, public and private.
Resolved, That it is the judgment of this House that that portion of the interest-bearing debt of the United States which shall become redeemable in the year 1881, or prior thereto, being in amount $782,000,000, should not be refunded beyond the power of the Government to call in said obligations and pay them at any time, but should be paid as rapidly as possible and according to contract. To enable the Government to meet these obligations, the mints of the United States should be operated to their full capacity in the coinage of standard silver dollars and such other coinage as the business interests of the country may require.
After a thirteen weeks' struggle he secured consideration of this resolution, but it was defeated by a vote of 117 to 83.
He has, ever since his entrance into Congress, been a consistent and persistent advocate of the restoration of bimetallism. He was the candidate of the Greenback-Labor party for President in 1880, and received 307,740 votes. In 1892 he was the candidate of the Populist party for the Presidency and received 1,040,600 votes. His platform in 1892 was the first national platform to expressly declare for the ratio of 16 to 1. In 1894 he was nominated for Congress on a 16 to 1 platform in the Council Bluffs (Iowa) district by the Populists and Democrats. After the Democratic National Convention of 1896 had declared unequivocally for independent bimetallism, Mr. Weaver took