CHAPTER I.

PERSONAL SKETCH OF HON. WILLIAM MCKINLEY, BY HON. JOHN SHERMAN.

B

Y request I write this sketch of the life and traits of Hon. William McKinley, nominee

of the Republican party for the high office of President of the United States.

He was born at Niles, Ohio, January 29th, 1843, and is, therefore, just past fifty-three years of age. He is now in the prime of vigorous manhood, and his powers of endurance are not excelled by any American of his age. The best evidence of this is the many campaigns which he has made during his public life in behalf of the Republican party. He has proved his ability and endurance by the number and perfection of the speeches which he has delivered.

His education, for reasons that could not be surmounted, was limited to the public schools of Ohio, and to a brief academic course in Allegheny College. He taught school in the country and accumulated the small means necessary to defray the expenses of that sort of education. This is the kind of schooling that

has produced many of the most eminent Americans in public and private life.

McKinley entered the Union Army in June, 1861, enlisting in the Twenty-Third Ohio Infantry, when a little more than seventeen years of age. This was a noted regiment. Among its earlier field officers may be mentioned General W. S. Rosecrans, General Scammon, General Stanley Matthews, General Rutherford B. Hayes, General Comley, and many other conspicuous men. He served during the entire war, rising from the position of a private to the rank of major. He was a soldier on the front line, served in battles, marches, bivouacs and campaigns, and received the official commendation of his superior officers on very many occasions. He returned to Ohio with a record of which any young man might well be proud, and to which the old soldiers of the country point with enthusiasm now that he is honored by a presidential nomination. There are in the United States at this time more than a million soldiers of the late war who served on the Union side, still living and voting, and they have sons and their relatives, all of whom, taken in the aggregate, become a power in a presidential election. His military career, while he was not in high command, is full of heroic incidents, which are proven not only by contemporaneous publications in the newspapers, but by official reports of his superior officers. He was not only a gallant soldier, full of endurance and personal energy, but he was the calm, judicious staff

officer, who won the commendations of his superiors by the exhibition of good judgment and wise administrative capacity.

Returning from the war he found it necessary to choose his employment for life, and without further schooling he entered earnestly upon the study of law in the office of Judge Poland, and was a careful, faithful, industrious, and competent student. He entered the Albany Law School, and graduated from that institution with high honors. He then began the practice of law in Canton with the same enthusiasm and devotion to duty which he had always manifested. As a practitioner at the bar he at once exhibited superior qualities, careful, studious, and faithful. He was elected Prosecuting Attorney of his county, and distinguished himself by his learning, fidelity, and efficiency in the discharge of his duties. to the public and his clients.

He was elected a member of the 45th Congress, and served in that Congress and the 46th, 47th, 48th, 49th, and was certified as elected to the 50th, but was excluded by a Democratic majority in a contest, but was returned to the 51st, making his congressional career nearly fourteen years. As a member of Congress he was attentive, industrious, and untiring, working his way gradually until he reached the post of leader of the Republican majority of the 51st Congress. He did not attain this position by accident or by any fortuitous circumstance, but by constant attention to his duties and a careful study of

the public measures of importance. He was a candidate for Speaker of the House of Representatives of the 51st Congress. Mr. Reed, the successful candidate, appointed him as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, and he entered upon the duties incident to that position with great energy and intelligence. There was a necessity and a well-defined public demand for tariff legislation in that Congress. The Republican party had come into power by the election of Mr. Harrison, with the understanding and pledge that tariff revision should be accomplished at once. The tariff laws of 1883 required amendment and improvement on account of the lapse of time and change of circumstances. In 1890 it was decided to present a complete revision of the tariff, and to this work McKinley devoted himself with untiring industry. He had upon that committee many competent assistants, but the chief burdens necessarily fell upon the chairman. Mr. Speaker Reed was in hearty sympathy and earnest co-operation, and the House of Representatives, on the 21st day of May, 1890, passed the bill known as the McKinley Tariff Bill. Any one turning to the great debate in the House of Representatives pending the passage of that measure in the Committee of the Whole will appreciate the great scope of McKinley's knowledge of the subjectmatter of that enactment.

It has never been claimed by McKinley's friends that he was the sole author of the McKinley bill. Not only did he have able supporters and assistants,