This was a remarkable public utterance issued as the nation struggled with its loss and as the fallen president’s body was en route to Washington, thence to Canton for a final memorial service and burial. As his open casket lay in state in the Capitol Rotunda, 100,000 people filed by after standing for hours in the rain. In Canton, another 100,000 passed by as McKinley lay in the Stark County Courthouse. He was buried at the West Lawn Cemetery in an elaborate tomb paid for in part by donations from more than a million schoolchildren. Other memorials emerged throughout Ohio, including in front of the Statehouse Building, at his birthplace town of Niles, and elsewhere—most of them funded by citizen donations. Twenty Ohio schools bear his name. Writer Kevin Phillips has suggested this outpouring of commemoration indicates Ohioans believed McKinley would loom large in history.
It wasn’t to be. Generally lost to the country’s historical consciousness, McKinley today languishes at a middling level in the periodic academic polls on presidential standing that are viewed collectively as history’s judgment on White House performance. In seven of the most prominent of these polls conducted since Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr. pioneered the concept in 1948, the Ohioan is ranked variously at 15th, 16th, and 14th. Only in one, a 1982 Chicago Tribune survey, does he reach as high as 11th. Often he ranks below such undistinguished or failed presidents as Chester Arthur, Martin Van Buren, Rutherford Hayes, Grover Cleveland, and John Quincy Adams.
And yet it can’t be denied that momentous events occurred during the McKinley presidency or that the country moved into a bold new era of economic growth and global stature—and also of Republican political dominance that lasted for most of the next thirty-six years. Indeed few chief executives have presided over so many pivotal developments in so many civic areas: the definitive embrace of the gold standard, annexation of Hawaii, destruction of the Spanish Empire and consolidation of America’s Caribbean sphere of influence, the rescue of Cuba, the push into the Pacific with the Philippines and Guam, the open door policy in China, the doctrine of noncolonial imperialism, the emergence of reciprocity as a trade policy synthesis (called “fair trade” in later decades), growing momentum toward an isthmian canal, the forging of a “special relationship” with Great Britain. Many of these accomplishments would become essential elements of what publisher Henry R. Luce later famously called the “American Century.” As Alan J. Lichtman and Ken DeCell write, McKinley enjoyed “one of the more successful incumbencies in American history.” They add, however, that he found himself “benefitting in part from circumstances beyond his control.”
And there’s the rub. Those inclined to discount or denigrate the McKinley presidency often acknowledge that, yes, big events occurred during his White House years, but little of it can be attributable to him. He was merely the passive occupant of the executive mansion as the country pursued its destiny. Thus do we return to the mystery of William McKinley, the persistent question of how this man, so lacking in dramatic flair or charismatic force, managed to bring about so much significant national change—or whether in fact he brought it about at all. The McKinley detractors argue that he didn’t. He was simply there.
A case in point is a book called First Great Triumph by the late Warren Zimmermann, profiling five Americans who “made their country a world power”: Roosevelt, Hay, Lodge, Mahan, and Root. It’s an excellent work on its own terms, but Zimmermann falters in explaining why he left out other powerful figures of the era, including McKinley. Historians differ, wrote Zimmermann, on whether McKinley “consciously masterminded America’s war with Spain or was dragged unwillingly into it.” He says the evidence “seems to support the latter interpretation, thus reducing McKinley’s importance as a force behind imperialism.”
This represents a false dichotomy. The president certainly didn’t set out to maneuver America into war with Spain, as Polk did with Mexico or Lincoln did with the errant South (or as Wilson later would do during the Great War in Europe). But neither was he dragged unwillingly into it. A close reading of the historical record shows that he consciously took a series of steps that rendered war increasingly inevitable. He abandoned Cleveland’s tilt toward Spain and away from the Cuban insurgents, audaciously placed difficult demands on the Iberian nation, refused to bend when Madrid pushed back, and ultimately embraced the position that Spain must leave the Caribbean, either peacefully or under military pressure. In the meantime he prepared his navy for war. True, he refused to recognize the insurgent movement as Cuba’s government, and his final actions leading to war could be described as ragged, but he understood fully where his actions were leading.
Further, it is difficult to argue that McKinley lacked importance as a force behind imperialism when he personally initiated Hawaiian annexation (after Cleveland had essentially killed it), took Puerto Rico and Guam, absorbed the Philippines, and applied all the military means at his disposal—in the face of serious domestic opposition—to pacify the Philippine archipelago as a U.S. possession.
Most of those close to McKinley, including at least four of the five men portrayed by Zimmermann, never questioned whose hand was on the tiller of the national destiny or whose judgment would prevail as government officials grappled with the challenge of molding unfolding events into American greatness. It was McKinley. As Root said, he always got his way, in part because he never cared who got the credit. With his inevitable commissions, constant overtures to members of Congress, openness toward the press, widespread public advocacy of his policies, leadership of indirection, and affable persona, he always managed to shepherd the flock where he wanted it to go. He seldom failed to get all the apples from the orchard.
And consider those who set themselves against him. While studiously avoiding overt political showdowns, McKinley always seemed to outmaneuver his rivals. Thomas Reed quit the field in frustration when he saw he couldn’t beat a man he had underestimated for years. Ben Foraker struggled manfully to gain dominance over the Ohio Republican Party so he could parlay it into a presidential run—and saw his rival get to the White House ahead of him and then gain total sway over the state party. Eastern bosses Tom Platt and Matthew Quay, full of wiles and resolve, were outmaneuvered in 1896. William Jennings Bryan rode to national prominence on the silver issue—and discovered four years later that McKinley had shorn it of its sting.
These things didn’t just happen. They happened because McKinley wanted them to happen and because he possessed the political tools to nudge events where he wanted them to go. There were missteps along the way, of course, and occasionally his tactics of patience and attrition were overwhelmed by political forces that had gained greater magnitude than he had anticipated. One could argue that his methodical ways and roundabout decision making robbed him of opportunities to have an even bigger impact on the history of his time than he actually did.
Certainly on the issue that helped define Roosevelt’s subsequent presidency, the trusts, he held back and sought to clear the decks on trade reciprocity before plunging into that thicket. But the record shows that he perceived clearly the necessity for reining in the monopolistic combinations that were grafting themselves upon industrial America with such menace. McKinley emphasized particularly to Dawes, who never ceased pounding away on the issue in conversations with the president, that this was something he would address—in his usual methodical, step-by-step way and when he perceived the time to be right.
But that methodical, step-by-step style contributed to the durability of the McKinley mystery through the decades. We have come to regard true presidential greatness as consisting of boldness, brashness, directness, and flamboyance. It is difficult for many in the television era to see anything approaching greatness in a man lacking in those traits, a man whose leadership was more of the hidden hand variety.
But the biggest contributor to McKinley’s standing in history was Theodore Roosevelt, whose leadership style could not have been further removed from that of McKinley. Impetuous, voluble, amusing, grandiose, prone to marking his terr
itory with political defiance, Roosevelt stirred the imagination of the American people as McKinley never had. To the Major’s solidity, safety, and caution, the Rough Rider offered a mind that moved “by flashes or whims or sudden impulses,” as William Allen White described it. He took the American people on a political roller-coaster ride, and to many it was thrilling.
But the New Yorker was never one to share the credit with others. His theatrical self-importance led even his children to acknowledge that he wanted to be “the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral.” It wasn’t surprising that soon he was denigrating the man whose presidency he had extolled through thousands of miles of political campaigning on his way to national power. Years later, after his own White House tenure, when he set about to destroy the presidency of his chosen successor and erstwhile close friend, William Taft, he described Taft as “a flubdub with a streak of the second rate and the common in him.” But he allowed as how he considered Taft “a better president than McKinley or Harrison.”
That view was picked up by Roosevelt biographers inclined to view the New Yorker’s piquant style as a requisite for presidential distinction. Thus did McKinley’s reputation fade through the decades as the Roosevelt story, heightened to accommodate the man’s sense of his own glory, dominated the country’s view of that historical period.
It’s interesting, though, that a different outlook has emerged from the research of the few McKinley biographers who have stepped forward since the late 1950s, when Margaret Leech published her splendid work, In the Days of McKinley. While implicitly acknowledging elements of the McKinley mystery, Leech pulled together the complexities of the time into a coherent picture of how this purposeful, deliberate, self-effacing politician moved men and events stealthily but effectively through tumultuous times. Since then subsequent works by Lewis L. Gould and H. Wayne Morgan have further illuminated the mystery. Gould calls McKinley “the first modern president” based on his embrace of the tools of executive power, his agenda-setting resolve, his foreign policy expansionism, and his success in positioning the Republican Party for ongoing political dominance. Morgan, noting that McKinley lacked the “grand manner” that would have highlighted his philosophy of government and politics, offers a poignant insight. “His reliance on manipulation and conciliation,” writes the biographer, “required unwritten understandings and personal agreements that kept him from history’s limelight, for he could not advertise his methods without destroying them.”
Just so. And that reality likely will continue to influence the nation’s view of William McKinley, a man of prudence, character, compassion, competence, patriotism, and subtle force who presided over momentous times in American history but whose true contributions to his country no doubt will remain a point of contention.
1 Short of stature but broad of shoulder, with luminescent gray-blue eyes and a ready smile, William McKinley pulled men to his side through a heavy quiet that was commanding. Generous-spirited and congenial, he mystified his opponents by always getting his way without resorting to overt tools of leadership. He left his nation, and even the world, far different from what they were when he assumed office.
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3 The president’s parents, William Sr. and Nancy, represented sturdy Ohio values of hard toil, thrift, modesty, education—and family fecundity. They produced nine children, eight of whom survived into adulthood. The elder McKinley managed blast furnaces in Niles, Ohio, where the family settled into a simple frame house, with part of the first floor set aside as a grocery store. “There wasn’t much of a town there then,” recalled the father.
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6 When his college education was cut short by a mysterious illness, young McKinley became a postal clerk and school teacher in Poland, Ohio. At age eighteen he entered the Civil War as a private and ended it as a brevet major, with most of his promotions coming after battlefield heroics. His commanding officer, the future president Rutherford Hayes, described the young man as “exceedingly bright . . . and gentlemanly. . . . He promises to be one of the best.”
7 Rutherford Hayes, upon learning that young McKinley planned to become a lawyer and enter politics, counseled that he should choose a more lucrative industrial career. The young man carefully preserved the letter but discarded the advice.
8 After clerking with a prominent Poland, Ohio, lawyer and studying at Albany Law School in New York, McKinley moved to Canton, Ohio, a burgeoning town near abundant coal mines and surrounded by rich farmlands. He soon emerged as a prominent local barrister and civic leader.
9 At first sight, McKinley was smitten by Ida Saxton, petite, lively daughter of Canton’s richest industrialist. She had grown up in splendor in what was known as “Saxton House” and soon demonstrated serious business acumen as manager of her father’s Canton bank. William and Ida were married in January 1871 and soon had two daughters, including Katie, shown here at age four. It was a storybook romance.
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13 The young McKinleys settled into a spacious Market Avenue home purchased for them by Ida’s father. Then fate crushed the sprightly Ida with a series of tragedies and maladies. When both daughters died before age five, Ida never recovered from the psychological blow. She developed epilepsy and other ailments. A carriage accident drained her stamina and impaired her mobility. She became sedentary and brittle. McKinley’s devotion to her would become a hallmark of his political persona.
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16 Throughout his political rise, McKinley interacted with the era’s three other giants of Ohio politics: Marcus Hanna, rich industrialist and political operator who became McKinley’s great benefactor; John Sherman, the state’s political colossus who became President McKinley’s secretary of state after age had sapped his abilities; and Joseph Benson Foraker, an occasional McKinley ally but more often a rival for position and power. In the end, McKinley and Hanna thoroughly outmaneuvered Foraker.
17 In his 1896 presidential bid, McKinley shunned campaign travel in favor of his famous “front porch” strategy, inviting Americans to visit his Canton home for oratory and refreshments. The candidate received some 750,000 Americans in hundreds of delegations from thirty states for tightly controlled and orchestrated political exchanges that were widely covered by reporters from across the nation. McKinley used the sessions to blast the soft-money “free silver” policies of his fiery opponent, William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska.
18 In his inaugural address, the new president promised “a firm and dignified foreign policy” that disavowed “wars of conquest” and “the temptation of territorial aggression.” It was a commitment soon honored in the breach, as a persistent and bloody anti-Spanish insurgency in colonial Cuba strained U.S.-Spanish relations to the breaking point. In his speech, the president also vowed to increase tariff rates and maintain a hard-currency monetary policy.
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21 McKinley lacked the bold imagination of the era’s greatest exponents of U.S. expansionism: Massachusetts senator Henry Cabot Lodge, brilliant, haughty Yankee with a romantic vision of America’s destiny; Theodore Roosevelt, assistant naval secretary, full of bustle and dreams of American greatness; and Alfred Thayer Mahan, persistent advocate of sea power as the agency of U.S. global power. Events soon nudged the president in the direction of these men’s national ambitions.
22 When the USS Maine, sent to Cuba by McKinley to protect Americans threatened by the chaos of insurrection, blew up in Havana harbor, war became inevitable. McKinley long since had concluded Spain must leave Cuba, either peacefully or through U.S. military pressure. Within weeks of war’s declaration, Commodore (later Admiral) George Dewey destroyed Spain’s Pacific fleet at Manila, thus becoming an instant national hero. Shortly thereafter, the War Department under Russell Alger captured Cuba’s second-largest city, Santiago, but poor management of the war effort cost Alger his reputation and his job.
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25 John Hay, McKinley’s ambassador to Britain and then secretary of state, performed brilliantly in both roles. He cemented the “Special Relationship” with the British during his ambassadorial tenure and later ended the Western carve-up of China with his “Open Door” policy of equal treatment for countries seeking trade and economic development in the Middle Kingdom. The president called Hay’s behavior in office “handsome.”
26 Elihu Root, a leading New York lawyer, was taken aback when asked to become war secretary. “I know nothing about war,” he said. But McKinley’s intermediary said the president wanted “a lawyer to direct the government of these Spanish islands, and you are the lawyer he wants.” Beguiled by the logic, Root took the job, to McKinley’s “great satisfaction.” It proved to be a smart move by the president.
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29 McKinley’s expansionist policies, particularly his decision to take the whole of the Philippines as a U.S. colony, generated a powerful anti-imperialist movement. Carl Schurz (above left), leading intellectual and activist of his day, railed against the policies of his former friend. House Speaker Thomas Reed (above right), called “the Czar” by friend and foe, quit his post in frustration at his inability to blunt the president’s expansionism. Another leading anti-imperialist was Mark Twain, who directed a blistering assault at the president.
President McKinley Page 57