Editing William McKinley (section)

==Rising politician (1877–1895)==
===Spokesman for protection===
{{for|additional information on the currency question|Cross of Gold speech#Background}}
{{quote box | align = right | width = 24em | salign = right
| quote =  Under [[free trade]] the trader is the master and the producer the slave. Protection is but the law of nature, the law of self-preservation, of self-development, of securing the highest and best destiny of the race of man. [It is said] that protection is immoral&nbsp;... Why, if protection builds up and elevates 63,000,000 [the U.S. population] of people, the influence of those 63,000,000 of people elevates the rest of the world. We cannot take a step in the pathway of progress without benefiting mankind everywhere. Well, they say, "Buy where you can buy the cheapest"&nbsp;... Of course, that applies to labor as to everything else. Let me give you a maxim that is a thousand times better than that, and it is the protection maxim: "Buy where you can pay the easiest." And that spot of earth is where labor wins its highest rewards.
| source = William McKinley, speech made October 4, 1892, Boston, Massachusetts}}

McKinley took his congressional seat in October 1877, when President Hayes summoned Congress into special session.{{efn|Until the ratification of the [[Twentieth Amendment to the United States Constitution|20th Amendment]] in 1933, the Constitution prescribed that Congress begin its regular sessions in early December. See [[US Senate]], [[US Congress]].}} With the Republicans in the minority, McKinley was given unimportant committee assignments, which he undertook conscientiously.{{sfn|Leech|p=20}} McKinley's friendship with Hayes did McKinley little good on [[Capitol Hill]], as the president was not well regarded by many leaders there.{{sfn|Leech|p=37}} The young congressman broke with Hayes on the question of the currency, but it did not affect their friendship.{{sfn|Morgan|p=47}} The United States had effectively been placed on the [[gold standard]] by the [[Coinage Act of 1873]]; when silver prices dropped significantly, many sought to make silver again a legal tender, equally with gold. Such a course would be inflationary, but advocates argued that the economic benefits of the increased [[money supply]] would be worth the inflation; opponents warned that "[[free silver]]" would not bring the promised benefits and would harm the United States in international trade.{{sfn|Horner|pp=180–81}} McKinley voted for the [[Bland–Allison Act]] of 1878, which mandated large government purchases of silver for striking into money, and also joined the large majorities in each house that overrode Hayes's veto of the legislation. In so doing, McKinley voted against the position of the House Republican leader, [[James Garfield]], a fellow Ohioan and his friend.{{sfnm|Morgan||1pp=46–47|Horner||2pp=181–82}}

[[File:Mckin.jpg|thumb|left|McKinley as a Representative {{circa}} 1870s]]

From his first term in Congress, McKinley was a strong advocate of protective tariffs. The primary intention of such imposts was not to raise revenue, but to allow American manufacturing to develop by giving it a price advantage in the domestic market over foreign competitors. McKinley biographer [[Margaret Leech]] noted that Canton had become prosperous as a center for the manufacture of farm equipment because of [[protectionism|protection]], and that this may have helped form his political views. McKinley introduced and supported bills that raised protective tariffs, and opposed those that lowered them or imposed tariffs simply to raise revenue.{{sfnm|Leech||1pp=36–37|Phillips||2pp=42–44}} Garfield's election as president in 1880 created a vacancy on the [[House Ways and Means Committee]]; McKinley was selected to fill it, gaining a spot on the most powerful committee after only two terms.{{sfn|Morgan|p=55}}

McKinley increasingly became a significant figure in national politics. In 1880, he served a brief term as Ohio's representative on the [[Republican National Committee]]. In 1884, he was elected a delegate to [[1884 Republican National Convention|that year's Republican convention]], where he served as chair of the Committee on Resolutions and won plaudits for his handling of the convention when called upon to preside. By 1886, McKinley, Senator [[John Sherman]], and Governor [[Joseph B. Foraker]] were considered the leaders of the Republican party in Ohio.{{sfn|Phillips|pp=60–61}} Sherman, who had helped to found the Republican Party, ran three times for the Republican nomination for president in the 1880s, each time failing,{{sfn|Morgan|pp=73–74}} while Foraker began a meteoric rise in Ohio politics early in the decade. Hanna, once he entered public affairs as a political manager and generous contributor, supported Sherman's ambitions, as well as those of Foraker. The latter relationship broke off at the [[1888 Republican National Convention]], where McKinley, Foraker, and Hanna were all delegates supporting Sherman. Convinced Sherman could not win, Foraker threw his support to [[Maine]] Senator [[James G. Blaine]], the unsuccessful Republican 1884 presidential nominee. When Blaine said he was not a candidate, Foraker returned to Sherman, but the nomination went to former [[Indiana]] senator [[Benjamin Harrison]], who was elected president. In the bitterness that followed the convention, Hanna abandoned Foraker. For the rest of McKinley's life, the Ohio Republican Party was divided into two factions, one aligned with McKinley, Sherman, and Hanna, and the other with Foraker.{{sfn|Horner|pp=59–60, 72–78}} Hanna came to admire McKinley and became a friend and close adviser to him. Although Hanna remained active in business and in promoting other Republicans, in the years after 1888, he spent an increasing amount of time boosting McKinley's political career.{{sfn|Horner|pp=80–81}}

In 1889, with the Republicans in the majority, McKinley sought election as [[Speaker of the United States House of Representatives|Speaker of the House]]. He failed to gain the post, which went to [[Thomas Brackett Reed|Thomas B. Reed]] of [[Maine]]; however, Speaker Reed appointed McKinley chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. The Ohioan guided the [[McKinley Tariff]] of 1890 through Congress; although McKinley's work was altered through the influence of special interests in the Senate, it imposed a number of protective tariffs on foreign goods.{{sfn|Phillips|pp=27, 42–43}}

===Gerrymandering and defeat for re-election===
Recognizing McKinley's potential, the Democrats, whenever they controlled the Ohio legislature, sought to [[Gerrymandering|gerrymander]] or redistrict him out of office.{{sfn|Phillips|p=27}} In 1878, McKinley was redistricted to the [[Ohio's 16th congressional district|16th congressional district]]; he won anyway, causing Hayes to exult, "Oh, the good luck of McKinley! He was gerrymandered out and then beat the gerrymander! We enjoyed it as much as he did."{{sfn|Morgan|p=54}} After the 1882 election, McKinley was unseated on an election contest by a near party-line House vote.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=59–60}} Out of office, he was briefly depressed by the setback, but soon vowed to run again. The Democrats again redistricted Stark County for the 1884 election; McKinley was returned to Congress anyway.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=60–62}}

[[File:Judge cover September 1890 - On to Ohio.png|thumb|''[[Judge (magazine)|Judge]]'' magazine cover from September 1890, showing McKinley (left) having helped dispatch Speaker Reed's opponent in early-voting Maine, hurrying off with the victor to McKinley's "[[gerrymander|jerrymandered]]" Ohio district]]
For 1890, the Democrats gerrymandered McKinley one final time, placing Stark County in the same district as one of the strongest pro-Democrat counties, [[Holmes County, Ohio|Holmes]], populated by solidly Democratic [[Pennsylvania Dutch]]. Based on past results, Democrats thought the new boundaries should produce a Democratic majority of 2,000 to 3,000. The Republicans could not reverse the gerrymander, as legislative elections would not be held until 1891, but they could throw all their energies into the district. The McKinley Tariff was a main theme of the Democratic campaign nationwide, and there was considerable attention paid to McKinley's race. The Republican Party sent its leading orators to Canton, including Blaine (then [[United States Secretary of State|Secretary of State]]), Speaker Reed, and President Harrison. The Democrats countered with their best spokesmen on tariff issues.{{sfn|Jensen|pp=150–51}} McKinley tirelessly stumped his new district, reaching out to its 40,000 voters to explain that his tariff:

{{blockquote |
was framed for the people&nbsp;... as a defense to their industries, as a protection to the labor of their hands, as a safeguard to the happy homes of American workingmen, and as a security to their education, their wages, and their investments&nbsp;... It will bring to this country a prosperity unparalleled in our own history and unrivalled in the history of the world."{{sfn|McKinley|p=464}}
}}
[[File:William McKinley by Courtney Art Studio, 1896.jpg|left|thumb|McKinley in 1896]]
Democrats ran a strong candidate in former lieutenant governor [[John G. Warwick]]. To drive their point home, they hired young partisans to pretend to be peddlers, who went door to door offering 25-cent tinware to housewives for 50 cents, explaining the rise in prices was due to the McKinley Tariff. In the end, McKinley lost by 300 votes, but the Republicans won a statewide majority and claimed a moral victory.{{sfn|Jensen|pp=151–53}}

===Governor of Ohio (1892–1896)===
Even before McKinley completed his term in Congress, he met with a delegation of Ohioans urging him to run for governor. Governor [[James E. Campbell]], a Democrat, who had defeated Foraker in 1889, was to seek re-election in 1891. The Ohio Republican party remained divided, but McKinley quietly arranged for Foraker to nominate him at the 1891 state Republican convention, which chose McKinley by acclamation. The former congressman spent much of the second half of 1891 campaigning against Campbell, beginning in his birthplace of Niles. Hanna, however, was little seen in the campaign; he spent much of his time raising funds for the election of legislators pledged to vote for Sherman in the 1892 senatorial election (state legislators still elected US Senators).{{sfn|Horner|p=46}}{{sfn|Morgan|pp=117–19}}{{efn|Before the passage of the [[Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution]] in 1913, senators were elected by state legislatures.}} McKinley won the 1891 election by some 20,000 votes;{{sfn|Williams|p=50}} the following January, Sherman, with considerable assistance from Hanna, turned back a challenge by Foraker to win the legislature's vote for another term in the US Senate.{{sfn|Horner|pp=86–87}}

[[File:Blaine breaks out.png|right|thumb|Even after his final run for president in 1884, [[James G. Blaine]] was still seen as a possible candidate for the Republican nomination. In this 1890 ''Puck'' cartoon, he is startling Reed and McKinley (right) as they make their plans for 1892.]]

Ohio's governor had relatively little power—for example, he could recommend legislation, but not veto it—but with Ohio a key [[swing state]], its governor was a major figure in national politics.{{sfn|Williams|p=117}} Although McKinley believed that the health of the nation depended on that of business, he was evenhanded in dealing with labor.{{sfn|Gould|p=7}} He procured legislation that set up an arbitration board to settle work disputes and obtained passage of a law that fined employers who fired workers for belonging to a union.{{sfn|Williams|p=122}}

President Harrison had proven unpopular; there were divisions even within the Republican party as the year 1892 began and Harrison began his re-election drive. Although no declared Republican candidate opposed Harrison, many Republicans were ready to dump the president from the ticket if an alternative emerged. Among the possible candidates spoken of were McKinley, Reed, and the aging Blaine. Fearing that the Ohio governor would emerge as a candidate, Harrison's managers arranged for McKinley to be permanent chairman of [[1892 Republican National Convention|the convention]] in [[Minneapolis]], requiring him to play a public, neutral role. Hanna established an unofficial McKinley headquarters near the convention hall, though no active effort was made to convert delegates to McKinley's cause. McKinley objected to delegate votes being cast for him; nevertheless he finished second, behind the renominated Harrison, but ahead of Blaine, who had sent word he did not want to be considered.{{sfn|Horner|pp=92–96}} Although McKinley campaigned loyally for the Republican ticket, Harrison was defeated by former President Cleveland in [[1892 United States presidential election|the November election]]. In the wake of Cleveland's victory, McKinley was seen by some as the likely Republican candidate in 1896.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=128–29}}

Soon after Cleveland's return to office, hard times struck the nation with the [[Panic of 1893]]. A businessman in [[Youngstown, Ohio|Youngstown]], Robert Walker, had lent money to McKinley in their younger days; in gratitude, McKinley had often guaranteed Walker's borrowings for his business. The governor had never kept track of what he was signing; he believed Walker a sound businessman. In fact, Walker had deceived McKinley, telling him that new notes were actually renewals of matured ones. Walker was ruined by the recession; McKinley was called upon for repayment in February 1893.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=129–30}} The total owed was over $100,000 (equivalent to ${{Inflation|US|.1|1893|r=1}}&nbsp;million in {{Inflation-year|US}}) and a despairing McKinley initially proposed to resign as governor and earn the money as an attorney.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=130–34}} Instead, McKinley's wealthy supporters, including Hanna and Chicago publisher [[H. H. Kohlsaat]], became trustees of a fund from which the notes would be paid. Both William and Ida McKinley placed their property in the hands of the fund's trustees (who included Hanna and Kohlsaat), and the supporters raised and contributed a substantial sum of money. All of the couple's property was returned to them by the end of 1893, and when McKinley, who had promised eventual repayment, asked for the list of contributors, it was refused him. Many people who had suffered in the hard times sympathized with McKinley, whose popularity grew.{{sfn|Morgan|pp=130–34}} He was easily re-elected in November 1893, receiving the largest percentage of the vote of any Ohio governor since the Civil War.{{sfn|Phillips|p=67}}

McKinley campaigned widely for Republicans in the 1894 midterm congressional elections; many party candidates in districts where he spoke were successful. His political efforts in Ohio were rewarded with the election in November 1895 of a Republican successor as governor, [[Asa S. Bushnell (Governor)|Asa Bushnell]], and a Republican legislature that elected Foraker to the Senate. McKinley supported Foraker for the Senate and Bushnell (who was of Foraker's faction) for governor; in return, the new senator-elect agreed to back McKinley's presidential ambitions. With party peace in Ohio assured, McKinley turned to the national arena.{{sfn|Phillips|pp=69–70}}