Interesting letter responding to an inquiry about the price of silver from William R. Day, key adviser to William McKinley in the presidential campaign of 1896. This was the important political-economic issue of the day, as the populist, "free-silver" advocates championed by Democratic nominee William Jennings Bryan wanted to use silver as well as gold to back U.S. currency, an inflationary policy they felt would stimulate the economy and lift it out of the severe depression known as the Panic of 1893. The Republicans wanted to rely on more costly and stable gold, and Day had written to Dueber, whose watch case manufacturing company used both gold and silver, inquiring about prices and fluctuations. Dueber replied that silver was less stable, being far more plentiful and subject to price manipulations. He writes in part, "Silver, as money, is a relic of the past ages - because only the least advanced Nations us it largely as money. With our great Railroad facilities, with telegraphic and telephone communications, etc., there is but little use for Silver in our business transactions.... The points I touch upon in this letter, are not generally known; and of course the Silver Mine Owners and Owners of smelting works, do not make them public..." There are occasional pencil marks in the margin used to highlight paragraphs.