"Lively, definitive, eye-opening, [this book] by acclaimed historian Robert W. Merry brilliantly evokes the life and presidency of William McKinley, cut short by an assassin. Most often lost in the shadow of his brilliant and flamboyant successor, TR, the twenty-fifth president is presented by Merry as a transformative figure, the first modern Republican. It was President McKinley who established the United States as an imperial power. In the Spanish-American War he kicked Spain out of the Caribbean; in the Pacific he acquired Hawaii and the Philippines through war and diplomacy; he took the country to a strict gold standard; he developed the doctrine of 'fair trade'; he forced the 'Open Door' to China; and he forged the 'special relationship' with Great Britain. McKinley established the noncolonial imperialism that took America global. He set the stage for the bold leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, who built on his accomplishments. [This book] brings to life a sympathetic man and an often overlooked president. Merry raises his rank to a chief executive of consequence who paved the way for the American Century."--Dust jacket flap.
A bestselling historian and political commentator reconsiders McKinley's overshadowed legacy By any serious measurement, bestselling historian Kevin Phillips argues, William McKinley was a major American president. It was during his administration that the United States made its diplomatic and military debut as a world power. McKinley was one of eight presidents who, either in the White House or on the battlefield, stood as principals in successful wars, and he was among the six or seven to take office in what became recognized as a major realignment of the U.S. party system. Phillips, author of Wealth and Democracy and The Cousins' War, has long been fascinated with McKinley in the context of how the GOP began each of its cycles of power. He argues that McKinley's lackluster ratings have been sustained not by unjust biographers but by years of criticism about his personality, indirect methodologies, middle-class demeanor, and tactical inability to inspire the American public. In this powerful and persuasive biography, Phillips musters convincing evidence that McKinley's desire to heal, renew prosperity, and reunite the country qualify him for promotion into the ranks of the best chief executives.
History played a trick on McKinley. He has been consigned to the shadows between Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt, vilified or ignored by historians . . . It is a richly undeserved fate. As Eliot Vestner demonstrates in this narrative of the political life of William McKinley, there was much more to the twenty-fifth president’s tenure in office than history books allow. He was a popular president, winning a second term with ease. But only nine months into it, he was assassinated by a self-described anarchist. What more he might have accomplished is anyone’s guess. He had managed to successfully pull America out of one of the worst economic depressions yet experienced, the Panic of 1893. And his controversial tariffs strengthened industry and contributed to the overall wealth of the country, as did his return of the country to the gold standard. He also led the U.S. to victory in the Spanish-American war, and implemented the first steps toward building the Panama Canal, which his successor, Theodore Roosevelt, continued. Perhaps the most under-appreciated aspect of McKinley’s presidency was his advocacy for black civil rights, and his challenge to the white supremacy of the south. As governor of Ohio, he fought against lynching. He signed a ground-breaking anti-lynching bill. Ironically, as president, he had a much more difficult time combating violence and racial injustice because of the use of states’ rights as justification for voter suppression and terrorism towards blacks. He pursued opportunities to advance the interests of black Americans wherever he could, but his inability to stop the lynchings and disfranchisement of blacks was most regrettable. His successors had no interest in the race issue, which remained unresolved until the 1954 court decision in Brown v. The Board of Education. This book gives McKinley his due, and thereby helps us better understand a President of the United States whose work has seemingly been overlooked by most Americans today.
"In 1896 McKinley swept away all rivals to win the presidential nomination on the first ballot. Faced in the general election by the well-respected and highly touted orator William Jennings Bryan, Republicans adopted their "Front Porch Campaign." Thousands of citizens from across the country were brought to McKinley's home in Canton for a handshake and a few words. Hanna arranged for this $3.5 million campaign to be paid for by big business, with oil baron John D. Rockefeller writing the largest check. McKinley's military service and his support among veterans were significant factors in his campaign. He became the first presidential candidate in a generation to win a majority of the popular vote." "This extensively revised and expanded edition of H. Wayne Morgan's William McKinley and His America will be an important resource for historians and scholars."--BOOK JACKET.
This is an account of the Civil War service of President William McKinley, the last of the Civil War veterans to reach the White House and the only one who served in the ranks. It draws on a range of material to present a picture of McKinley as a soldier and his later life as a veteran in politics.
In Forgotten Legacy, Benjamin R. Justesen reveals a previously unexamined facet of William McKinley’s presidency: an ongoing dedication to the advancement of African Americans, including their appointment to significant roles in the federal government and the safeguarding of their rights as U.S. citizens. During the first two years of his administration, McKinley named nearly as many African Americans to federal office as all his predecessors combined. He also acted on many fronts to stiffen federal penalties for participation in lynch mobs and to support measures promoting racial tolerance. Indeed, Justesen’s work suggests that McKinley might well be considered the first “civil rights president,” especially when compared to his next five successors in office. Nonetheless, historians have long minimized, trivialized, or overlooked McKinley’s cooperative relationships with prominent African American leaders, including George Henry White, the nation’s only black congressman between 1897 and 1901. Justesen contends that this conventional, one-sided portrait of McKinley is at best incomplete and misleading, and often severely distorts the historical record. A Civil War veteran and the child of abolitionist parents, the twenty-fifth president committed himself to advocating for equity for America’s black citizens. Justesen uses White’s parallel efforts in and outside of Congress as the primary lens through which to view the McKinley administration’s accomplishments in racial advancement. He focuses on McKinley’s regular meetings with a small and mostly unheralded group of African American advisers and his enduring relationship with leaders of the new National Afro-American Council. His nomination of black U.S. postmasters, consuls, midlevel agency appointees, military officers, and some high-level officials—including U.S. ministers to Haiti and Liberia—serves as perhaps the most visible example of the president’s work in this area. Only months before his assassination in 1901, McKinley toured the South, visiting African American colleges to praise black achievements and encourage a spirit of optimism among his audiences. Although McKinley succumbed to political pressure and failed to promote equality and civil rights as much as he had initially hoped, Justesen shows that his efforts proved far more significant than previously thought, and were halted only by his untimely death.
*Includes pictures*Includes accounts of the assassination*Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading*Includes a table of contents"It was in my heart, there was no escape for me. I could not have conquered it had my life been at stake. There were thousands of people in town on Tuesday. I heard it was President's Day. All those people seemed bowing to the great ruler. I made up my mind to kill that ruler." - Leon CzolgoszIn September 1901, the city of Buffalo was full of celebration. The Pan-American Exposition was ongoing, and it brought notable figures to northern New York, including President William McKinley, who had been reelected less than a year earlier. But also in Buffalo was Leon Czolgosz, a young man who had turned to anarchy years earlier after losing his job, Embracing his philosophy wholeheartedly, Czolgosz believed it was his mission to take down a powerful leader he considered oppressive, and McKinley's attendance gave him the chance.President James Garfield had been assassinated just 20 years earlier, but McKinley didn't worry about presidential security or his own safety, and that was the case in Buffalo. McKinley's insistence on greeting the public and shaking hands allowed Czolgosz to walk up to him on September 6, 1901 at a public reception in the Temple of Music on the expo grounds and shoot him point blank, with one bullet grazing the president and another lodging in his abdomen. In the aftermath of the shooting, as Czolgosz was beaten and seized by the crowd, he uttered, "I done my duty." For his part, McKinley said, "He didn't know, poor fellow, what he was doing. He couldn't have known."Despite being president, McKinley's medical services were shoddy, and given the still primitive medical standards of the early 20th century, gunshots to the abdomen often brought death. One of the best known aspects of the assassination is that Thomas Edison's x-ray machine was on hand and may have been used to try to locate the bullet that doctors couldn't find, but for reasons that remain unknown, the x-ray machine was not used. Nevertheless, McKinley seemed to improve over the next few days, and people became optimistic he would be all right. As H. Wayne Morgan, one of McKinley's biographers, noted, "His hearty constitution, everyone said, would see him through. The doctors seemed hopeful, even confident ... It is difficult to understand the cheer with which they viewed their patient. He was nearly sixty years old, overweight, and the wound itself had not been thoroughly cleaned or traced. Precautions against infections, admittedly difficult in 1901, were negligently handled." Ultimately, McKinley's wounds became gangrenous a week after he was shot, and after he took a turn for the worse, he died on the morning of September 14, nearly 8 days after he was shot. The Assassination of President William McKinley: McKinley was the 3rd president to be assassinated, and today he is often remembered as one of the presidents to die in office after being elected every 20 years after William Henry Harrison's 1840 election. However, the most notable consequence of the assassination is who it brought to power. Ironically, New York Governor Theodore Roosevelt's political enemies hoped to rid the state of their progressive governor by elevating him to national prominence. At the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, the New York machine leaders decided to promote Roosevelt for the vice presidency, and in so doing, remove him from New York. At the time, the vice president was notoriously insignificant in national politics, so the political machinists thought that making Roosevelt the vice president would turn him into a nobody.The History and Legacy of the President's Death chronicles the tumultuous chain of events that led to McKinley's death and Roosevelt's presidency. Along with pictures and a bibliography, you'll learn about the assassination of McKinley like never before.
The only man to serve as president and chief justice, who approached every decision in constitutional terms, defending the Founders’ vision against new populist threats to American democracy William Howard Taft never wanted to be president and yearned instead to serve as chief justice of the United States. But despite his ambivalence about politics, the former federal judge found success in the executive branch as governor of the Philippines and secretary of war, and he won a resounding victory in the presidential election of 1908 as Theodore Roosevelt’s handpicked successor. In this provocative assessment, Jeffrey Rosen reveals Taft’s crucial role in shaping how America balances populism against the rule of law. Taft approached each decision as president by asking whether it comported with the Constitution, seeking to put Roosevelt’s activist executive orders on firm legal grounds. But unlike Roosevelt, who thought the president could do anything the Constitution didn’t forbid, Taft insisted he could do only what the Constitution explicitly allowed. This led to a dramatic breach with Roosevelt in the historic election of 1912, which Taft viewed as a crusade to defend the Constitution against the demagogic populism of Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. Nine years later, Taft achieved his lifelong dream when President Warren Harding appointed him chief justice, and during his years on the Court he promoted consensus among the justices and transformed the judiciary into a modern, fully equal branch. Though he had chafed in the White House as a judicial president, he thrived as a presidential chief justice.
