January 1, 1879, was
the date fixed by the act for resumption of redemption of greenbacks in
gold and on December 17, 1878, the premium on gold disappeared. From
that day on, the greenback became a dead issue.
Another factor of great importance was the large increase in the volume
of the currency. In 1881 the currency, which had averaged about
$725,000,000 for the years 1876-1878, reached over $1,111,000,000. Under
these conditions, all that remained available to the platform-makers and
propagandists of the party was their opposition to the so-called
"monopolistic" national banks with their control over currency and to
the refunding of the bonded debt of the government.
The disappearance of the financial issue snapped the threads which had
held together the farmer and the wage-worker. So long as depression
continued, the issue was financial and the two had, as they thought, a
common enemy--the banker. The financial issue once settled, or at least
suspended, the object of the attack by labor became the employer, and
that of the attack by the farmer--the railway corporation and the
warehouse man.
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