He was a serious man who cared deeply about substance.Īs a young Democratic congressman in 1892, Bryan made a three-hour speech on the floor of the House attacking high tariffs and calling for a progressive income tax. As he did on Friday, the president fills his talks with slogans about “making America great again” and angry jousts at “bad dudes” and “fake news.” Bryan, however, became a celebrated orator while still in his early 30s by giving lengthy, class-conscious addresses on thorny-but-vital economic issues. The Great Commoner’s speaking style also contrasted sharply with Trump’s. Bryan was the key figure in changing his party from a conservative one (on economic policy) to the modern liberal one that Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. As an editor of his own newspaper, he loved talking to reporters, and would never have considered attacking the press, even though most big-city dailies opposed him. He supported labor unions and free trade and called for a ban on private donations to political campaigns. The Nebraskan Democrat, whom his admirers dubbed “the Great Commoner,” was an economic progressive whose populist rhetoric targeted “the money power”-Wall Street investment houses, big industrial firms and the politicians, most of them Republican, who did their bidding. But the similarities between the two men as speakers end there.
Bryan, like Trump, did excel in front of mass audiences and often bashed the elites of his day.
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