Decorah Public Opinion

A REACTION ALREADY.
The Remarkable Free Silver Sentiment Gradually Changing to McKinley and Sound Money.
A strong reaction is already setting in against the free and unlimited coinage of silver vagary. The wild enthusiasm created at the Chicago convention by the oratory of Mr. Bryan is not so very strange if we interpret it in the light of the fact that the American people and especially our western people are radical and enthusiastic in their make-up. That remarkable incident which created such a stir in the convention in which our Iowa "Joan of Are" was the chief actor, furnishes another illustration, for it produced such a scene as would rarely be seen in any European country outside of Italy, France or Spain. Moreover, when we take into consideration another fact, viz: that we are a people who demand frequent changes not only in politics but in nearly, if not quite all other directions, the otherwise unaccountable attitude of the populists and their allies, the silver democrats, is measurably explained.
It is not strange, therefore, in view of these facts, that the white froth of the "free and unlimited coinage of silver" illusion should even at this early day begin to pass away, and to reveal underneath it the golden cream of moral and financial integrity.
In a personal letter from a friend who is a prominent business man of a northern Nebraska town, and who has been making a visit in western Iowa, is contained the following conclusive evidence that the strong sentiment for free silver, even in Mr. Bryan's own state, is steadily changing, and that many silverites, when informed as to the actual situation, readily renounce the doctrine of the populists. He says:
"I thought that everybody had turned over and began talking silver, but before I came away I could see that the sentiment had changed greatly. That is the case here, I think. Of course the "pops" are in the majority, but they seem to be studying the question and many of them will vote for McKinley and sound money. I heard a "pop newspaper man say that in case Bryan should be elected he could take his gold dollar to any bank and exchange it for sixteen silver dollars. Others think that sixteen silver dollars will be coined and put into circulation for every gold dollar in circulation and in the reserve. These are the ideas they have now, and I think that after a little intelligent discussion, they will be slow to risk anything on the "boy orator of the Platte."