William McKinley, the Noble American

AN INTRODUCTION

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OR the third time in a period of little more than a generation, the assassin's bullet has plunged the great republic of the world into the saddest bereavement. Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley; the three Presidents of the United States who would be selected from all the many who have filled that highest civil trust of the world as the most kindly and generous in disposition, and most free from enmity, have fallen by the hand of the assassin. Here in the freest government in the world, with the largest measure of general prosperity enjoyed by any people; under a government so gentle in its operations that it is unfelt in its exactions, and rises to its highest measure of grandeur only when the rights of the citizen or the honor of the nation are imperiled, it is most appalling to record the fall of rulers by unprovoked redhanded murder in a greater degree than has been experienced in any other nation of the world during the last forty years.

It is not surprising that the grinding oppression of despotic governments under which many poverty-stricken subjects are driven to despair, should school the assassin for the terrible work of taking revenge upon rulers who live in boundless luxury; but here, where the President is himself one of the people, lives as they live, mingles with them as one of them, and is accessible to the humblest sovereign of the nation, only some fiend in human form, in

whose heart every instinct of manhood was strangled, could plot or execute the murder of the President of the United States.

President McKinley was one of the gentlest and kindest of

His life was a beautiful poem in many cantos, exhibiting every phase of the best and noblest attributes of human character. Even when racked with pain by the wound of the assassin, he spoke of his murderer only in terms of kindness, asking that he should be treated fairly, and he died as he lived, exhibiting the grandest qualities of Christian manhood. His last words were fitly uttered to the long-suffering, accomplished and devoted wife, at whose home altar there had never been a shadow of discord, and whose life was benignant with that beautiful affection that makes home the sanctuary of its worshippers. With his hand clasped in hers, and just when passing to final unconsciousness, he whispered the sentence that is now immortal: "God's will, not ours, be done.'

The life of William McKinley is only one of the many which so impressively illustrate the grandest feature of our great free government that gives opportunity alike to all-the highest and the lowest. He was born at Niles, Trumbull County, Ohio, on the 29th of January, 1843. His early opportunities were limited, but he made the best use of them by attending the public schools until civil war spread its deadly pall over the nation. He was then only eighteen years of age, but he promptly enlisted as a private in the Twenty-third Ohio Volunteers. Other heroes of the war have been honored with the Presidency, but McKinley is the only one who served in the ranks, bearing his musket in the flame of battle. He rose to the rank of captain because of special mention in dispatches for courage and efficiency as a soldier, and at the end of the war he returned to his home, having then just passed his majority, with the rank of brevet major. He promptly resumed his studies, and in due time was admitted to the bar, when he located at Canton, Stark County, Ohio, that has since been his home.

McKinley took an active part in politics in early life, and in 1859 he made his first appearance as a candidate on the Republican

ticket for District Attorney, and though the county was strongly Democratic, he was elected by a small majority. He rose rapidly in his profession, but in 1876, at the age of thirty-two, he was elected to Congress, and after that he was continuously in public life. He was chosen to Congress at consecutive elections until 1897. He had become a great political power in his State and also in the councils of the nation, and his political opponents determined to retire him to private life. The Democrats controlled the Legislature in 1890, and enacted a new Congressional apportionment, the chief purpose of which was to connect Stark County, the home of McKinley, with such an overwhelming Democratic majority as to render his re-election impossible. But even with this large adverse majority to overcome, the Democrats feared the popularity of McKinley, and they nominated against him one of the strongest men in the district. The contest became one of national interest, and McKinley made the most aggressive canvass of his life, although to all but himself it seemed to be utterly hopeless. He was defeated by 846 majority where his opponent, by a strict party vote, should have been victor by nearly 4,000. The Republicans of Ohio felt keenly the arbitrary effort made to retire McKinley from public trust by a Congressional gerrymander, and the next year he was unanimously nominated for Governor of the State and elected by an unusually large majority. He filled the executive office with the same conscientious devotion to public duty that had always characterized him, and in 1893 he was unanimously nominated for re-election, and was successful by the largest popular majority ever given in the State, with the single exception of Governor Brough's majority over Valandingham for Governor in 1863.

In both of these State contests his political opponents made desperate efforts to defeat him, or at least to reduce his majority, and thus weaken him as a political factor in State and national affairs, but when he was re-elected Governor by the stupendous majority of 80,995 he was at once recognized by his friends, not

only at home but throughout the country, as a promising candidate for the Presidency. Even one year before that election he was made a candidate for the Presidency before the national convention at Minneapolis. He had not been generally discussed as an aspirant at that time, and when the convention met he had no expectation that his name would be presented. He was made President of the convention without a contest, and, to his surprise, a portion of the opposition to Harrison suddenly concentrated upon him, and the vote of his State was cast for himself with the single exception of his own vote, which was given to Harrison. The only ballot for President gave Harrison 535, Blaine 1821⁄2, McKinley 182, Reed 4 and Robert Lincoln 1. McKinley entered the contest of 1892 with great energy and zeal, and was accepted by all as the ablest and most effective of the champions of the Harrison cause. He became recognized in that struggle as the “leader of leaders" in his own party, and it was only logical that after his re-election for Governor of Ohio by an almost unprecedented majority, he should be made the Republican candidate for President in 1896.

The battle for the Presidential succession on the Republican side in 1896 was a very earnest one. That McKinley was the choice of the great mass of the Republican people, excepting when controlled by local preferences, was conceded by all, but he had one of the ablest and most aggressive of the Republican national leaders as his chief competitor in Thomas B. Reed, then Speaker of the House. Senator Hanna cherished a romantic attachment for McKinley, as was shown by his prompt intervention to rescue McKinley from the bankruptcy into which he was suddenly precipitated, when Governor, by the mismanagement of a business enterprise with which he was connected as a partner, but for the direction of which he had ne`ther time por fitness... Hanna proved himself to be one of the great Warwicks of the Republic, ranking to-day with Thurlew Weed and the elder Francis P Blair, of olden times. He devoted himself tirelessly for more than a year to