I’m currently teaching President McKinley in class. You probably know the story of McKinley and Bryan in the elections of 1896 and 1900. I have to admit, I was somewhat disappointed to see McKinley end up at #16 on the recent survey of presidential leadership. Not that I put much stock in this type of survey, but to see McKinley below the likes of Monroe and Polk is a tad aggravating.
I cannot say I am a total fan of McKinley politically, after all, it was in his name that the country got its all-time high protective tariff in 1890 (not to mention his later bellicosity). The McKinley Tariff set the taxation rate on imports at a whopping 48.4%. The insanity of such an idea bore itself out in the resulting Panic of 1893. But after bargaining away a strict gold standard to get the tariff passed, the republican bore down on the hard money standard for the Election of 1896. I must admit, though, that even as a congressman McKinley was not an ardent goldbug. He voted twice for Bland Free Coinage and even put forth an platform at the 1888 Republican convention that supported both gold and silver coinage. But in the end, when it came down to defending hard money against the bombastic William Jennings Bryan, McKinley passes muster. If we can fault McKinley for all of the above, we must recognize the importance of shunning silver in 1896. In the midst of the ‘long depression’, diving into silver would have caused catastrophic economic problems.
But back to the survey, for me, McKinley is just one of those presidents that you pull for subjectively. His policies were pretty flawed, but this was a good man. A man with no extrodinary skill. A man who lost his only two daughters before the age of five. A man would patiently cared for his sick wife. A man who, according to one historian, never sought political promotion in a ‘Machevellian’ manner. A man who, as governor, paid out of his own pocket for a railroad car of food for the destitute. A man who then spearheaded, not the largest public spending campaign, but charity drives to feed and cloth more than 10,000 people.
Teacherman Gold, History election of 1896, free coinage, Gold, mckinley tariff, panic of 1893, president, silver, william jennings bryan, william mckinley
On April 9, President Barack Obama requested an extra $83.4 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The president does not use the term ‘war on terror’, but that is just another semantic ruse that he has perfected. This misallocation of additional funds, while not surprising, marks another sad day for peace and liberty.
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