Some people told me the economic article about the “Fourth Turning” was too complex. Fair enough. So now we’re walking it out piece by piece. This time: how we got here, why Bryan wasn’t crazy, and why gold and silver are back in the headlines.
William Jennings Bryan had the look of a man with fire in his lungs and scripture in his pockets. He stepped onto the stage in Chicago in July 1896, just 36 years old, and delivered what would become one of the most famous speeches in American political history. His voice hit like a train—“You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold”—and the room erupted. Men wept. Reporters dropped their pens. A thousand delegates surged to nominate him for president on the spot.
That speech was about monetary policy, yes. But not in the way some economist in a bowtie tells it. It was about control. It was about who gets to decide what your money is worth, and how hard you’ll work to earn it back after it disappears into someone else’s account. Bryan was talking about silver and gold, but what he really meant was this: If you can’t control your own money, someone else controls your life.
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