THE GREENBACK INTERLUDE 83 



The Cleveland convention, attended by repre- 

 sentatives of twelve States, completed the organiza- 

 tion of the Independent party, as it was officially 

 named, and made arrangements for the nominat- 

 ing convention. This was held at Indianapolis 

 on May 17, 1876, with 240 delegates representing 

 eighteen States. Ignatius Donnelly, who had ap- 

 parently changed his mind on the currency ques- 

 tion since 1873, was the temporary president. The 

 platform contained the usual endorsement of a 

 circulating medium composed of legal-tender notes 

 interconvertible with bonds but gave first place to 

 a demand for "the immediate and unconditional 

 repeal of the specie-resumption act." This meas- 

 ure, passed by Congress in January, 1875, had 

 fixed January 1, 1879, as the date when the Gov- 

 ernment would redeem greenbacks at their face 

 value in coin. Although the act made provision 

 for the permanent retirement of only a part of the 

 greenbacks from circulation, the new party de- 

 nounced it as a "suicidal and destructive policy of 

 contraction. " Another plank in the platform, and 

 one of special interest in view of the later free silver 

 agitation, was a protest against the sale of bonds 

 for the purpose of purchasing silver to be sub- 

 stituted for the fractional currency of war times. 



