William Jennings Bryan

William Jennings Bryan was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the Democratic Party, running three times as the party's nominee for President of the United States in the 1896, 1900, and 1908 elections. He served in the House of Representatives from 1891 to 1895 and as the Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1915. Because of his faith in the wisdom of the common people, Bryan was often called "the Great Commoner", and because of his rhetorical power and early fame as the youngest presidential candidate, "the Boy Orator".

Born and raised in Illinois, Bryan moved to Nebraska in the 1880s. He won election to the U.S. House of Representatives in the 1890 elections, served two terms, and made an unsuccessful run for the U.S. Senate in 1894. At the 1896 Democratic National Convention, Bryan delivered his "Cross of Gold" speech which attacked the gold standard and the eastern moneyed interests and crusaded for inflationary policies built around the expanded coinage of silver coins. In a repudiation of incumbent President Grover Cleveland and his conservative Bourbon Democrats, the Democratic convention nominated Bryan for president, making Bryan the youngest major party presidential nominee in U.S. history. Subsequently, Bryan was also nominated for president by the left-wing Populist Party, and many Populists would eventually follow Bryan into the Democratic Party. In the intensely-fought 1896 presidential election, the Republican nominee, William McKinley, emerged triumphant. At age 36, Bryan remains the youngest person in United States history to receive an electoral vote for president. Bryan gained fame as an orator, as he invented the national stumping tour when he reached an audience of 5 million people in 27 states in 1896.

Bryan retained control of the Democratic Party and again won the presidential nomination in 1900. After the Spanish–American War, Bryan became a fierce opponent of American imperialism, and much of his campaign centered on that issue. In the election, McKinley again defeated Bryan and won several Western states that Bryan had won in 1896. Bryan's influence in the party weakened after the 1900 election, and the Democrats nominated the conservative Alton B. Parker in the 1904 presidential election. Bryan regained his stature in the party after Parker's resounding defeat by Theodore Roosevelt and voters from both parties increasingly embraced some of the progressive reforms that had long been championed by Bryan. Bryan won his party's nomination in the 1908 presidential election, but he was defeated by Roosevelt's chosen successor, William Howard Taft. Along with Henry Clay, Bryan is one of the two individuals who never won a presidential election despite receiving electoral votes in three separate presidential elections held after the ratification of the Twelfth Amendment.

After the Democrats won the presidency in the 1912 election, Woodrow Wilson rewarded Bryan's support with the important cabinet position of Secretary of State. Bryan helped Wilson pass several progressive reforms through Congress. In 1915, he considered that Wilson was too harsh on Germany and finally resigned after Wilson had sent Germany a note of protest with a veiled threat of war in response to the sinking of the Lusitania by a German U-boat. After leaving office, Bryan retained some of his influence within the Democratic Party, but he increasingly devoted himself to Prohibition, religious matters, and anti-evolution activism. He opposed Darwinism on religious and humanitarian grounds, most famously in the 1925 Scopes Trial, dying soon after. Bryan has elicited mixed reactions from various commentators, but is acknowledged by historians as one of the most influential figures of the Progressive Era.

Secretary of State :

President Wilson named Bryan as Secretary of State, the most prestigious appointive position. Bryan's extensive travels, popularity in the party, and support for Wilson in the election made him the obvious choice. Bryan took charge of a State Department that employed 150 officials in Washington and an additional 400 employees in embassies abroad. Early in Wilson's tenure, the president and the secretary of state broadly agreed on foreign policy goals, including the rejection of Taft's Dollar diplomacy. They also shared many priorities in domestic affairs and, with Bryan's help, Wilson orchestrated passage of laws that reduced tariff rates, imposed a progressive income tax, introduced new antitrust measures, and established the Federal Reserve System. Bryan proved particularly influential in ensuring that the president, rather than private bankers, was empowered to appoint the members of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. 

Secretary of State Bryan pursued a series of bilateral treaties that required both signatories to submit all disputes to an investigative tribunal. He quickly won approval from the president and the Senate to proceed with his initiative. In mid-1913, El Salvador became the first nation to sign one of Bryan's treaties, and 29 other countries, including every great power in Europe other than Germany and Austria-Hungary, also agreed to sign the treaties. Despite Bryan's stated aversion to conflict, he oversaw U.S. interventions in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Mexico. 

After World War I broke out in Europe, Bryan consistently advocated for American neutrality between the Entente and the Central Powers. With Bryan's support, Wilson initially sought to stay out of the conflict, urging Americans to be "impartial in thought as well as action". For much of 1914, Bryan attempted to bring a negotiated end to the war, but the leaders of both the Entente and the Central Powers were ultimately uninterested in American mediation. Bryan remained firmly committed to neutrality, but Wilson and others within the administration became increasingly sympathetic to the Entente.

The March 1915 Thrasher incident, in which a German U-boat sank a British passenger ship with an American citizen on board, provided a major blow to the cause of American neutrality. The May 1915 sinking of RMS Lusitania by another German U-boat further galvanized anti-German sentiment, as 128 Americans died in the incident. Bryan argued that the British blockade of Germany was as offensive as the German U-boat Campaign. He also maintained that by traveling on British vessels, "an American citizen can, by putting his own business above his regard for this country, assume for his own advantage unnecessary risks and thus involve his country in international complications". After Wilson sent an official message of protest to Germany and refused to warn Americans publicly not to travel on British ships, Bryan delivered his letter of resignation to Wilson on June 8, 1915.