VOLUME XVII, SLICE III✦

McKinley, William to Magnetism, Terrestrial

ARTICLES IN THIS SLICE:

McKINLEY, WILLIAM MADISON (Wisconsin, U.S.A.) McKINNEY (Texas, U.S.A.) MADOU, JEAN BAPTISTE MACKINTOSH, SIR JAMES MADOZ, PASCUAL MACKLIN, CHARLES MADRAS (Indian presidency) MACK VON LEIBERICH, KARL MADRAS (Indian city) McLANE, LOUIS MADRAZO Y KUNT, DON FEDERICO DE MACLAREN, CHARLES MADRID (province of Spain) MACLAREN, IAN MADRID (the capital of Spain) MACLAURIN, COLIN MADRIGAL M'LENNAN, JOHN FERGUSON MADURA (island) MACLEOD, HENRY DUNNING MADURA (city) MACLEOD, NORMAN MADVIG, JOHAN NICOLAI MACLISE, DANIEL MAECENAS, GAIUS MACLURE, WILLIAM MAECIANUS, LUCIUS VOLUSIUS MacMAHON, MARIE EDMÉ MAURICE DE MAELDUIN, VOYAGE OF McMASTER, JOHN BACH MAELIUS, SPURIUS MACMILLAN MAELSTROM MACMONNIES, FREDERICK WILLIAM MAENADS MACNAGHTEN, SIR WILLIAM HAY MAENIUS, GAIUS MacNALLY, LEONARD MAERLANT, JACOB VAN MACNEE, SIR DANIEL MAES, NICOLAS MACNEIL, HERMON ATKINS MAESTRO McNEILE, HUGH MAETERLINCK, MAURICE MACNEILL, HECTOR MAFEKING MACOMB MAFFEI, FRANCESCO SCIPIONE MACOMER MAFIA MACON, NATHANIEL MAFRA MÂCON (town of France) MAGADHA MACON (Georgia, U.S.A.) MAGALDÁN MACPHERSON, SIR DAVID LEWIS MAGALLANES MACPHERSON, JAMES MAGAZINE McPHERSON, JAMES BIRDSEYE MAGDALA MACQUARIE MAGDEBURG MACRAUCHENIA MAGEE, WILLIAM MACREADY, WILLIAM CHARLES MAGEE, WILLIAM CONNOR MACROBIUS, AMBROSIUS THEODOSIUS MAGELLAN, FERDINAND MACROOM MAGELLANIC CLOUDS MACUGNAGA MAGENTA MacVEAGH, WAYNE MAGGIORE, LAGO MADÁCH, IMRE MAGIC MADAGASCAR MAGIC SQUARE MADAN, MARTIN MAGINN, WILLIAM MADDALONI MAGISTRATE MADDEN, SIR FREDERIC MAGLIABECHI, ANTONIO DA MARCO MADDER MAGLIANI, AGOSTINO MADEC, RENÉ-MARIE MAGNA CARTA MADEIRA MAGNA GRAECIA MADELENIAN MAGNATE MADELEY MAGNES MADHAVA ACHARYA MAGNESIA MADI MAGNESITE MADISON, JAMES MAGNESIUM MADISON (Indiana, U.S.A.) MAGNETISM MADISON (New Jersey, U.S.A.) MAGNETISM, TERRESTRIAL

McKINLEY, WILLIAM (1843-1901), twenty-fifth president of the United States, was born in Niles, Trumbull county, Ohio, on the 29th of January 1843. His ancestors on the paternal side were Scotch-Irish who lived at Dervock, Co. Antrim, and spelled the family name "McKinlay." His great-great-grandfather settled in York county, Pennsylvania, about 1743, and from Chester county, Pennsylvania, his great-grandfather, David McKinley, who served as a private during the War of Independence, moved to Ohio in 1814. David's son James had gone in 1809 to Columbiana county, Ohio. His son William McKinley (b. 1807), like his father an iron manufacturer, was married in 1829 to Nancy Campbell Allison, and to them were born nine children, of whom William, the president, was the seventh. In 1852 the family removed to Poland, Mahoning county, where the younger William was placed at school. At seventeen he entered the junior class of Allegheny College, at Meadville, Pennsylvania; but he studied beyond his strength, and returned to Poland, where for a time he taught in a neighbouring country school. When the Civil War broke out in 1861 he promptly enlisted as a private in the 23rd Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He saw service in West Virginia, at South Mountain, where this regiment lost heavily, and at Antietam, where he brought up hot coffee and provisions to the fighting line; for this he was promoted second lieutenant on the 24th of September 1862. McKinley was promoted first lieutenant in February 1864, and for his services at Winchester was promoted captain on the 25th of July 1864. He was on the staff of General George Crook at the battles of Opequan, Fisher's Hill, and Cedar Creek in the Shenandoah valley, and on the 14th of March 1865 was brevetted major of volunteers for gallant and meritorious services. He also served on the staff of General Rutherford B. Hayes, who spoke highly of his soldierly qualities. He was mustered out with his regiment on the 26th of July 1865. Four years of army life had changed him from a pale and sickly lad into a man of superb figure and health.

After the war McKinley returned to Poland, and bent all his energy upon the study of law. He completed his preparatory reading at the Albany (N.Y.) law school, and was admitted to the bar at Warren, Ohio, in March 1867. On the advice of an elder sister, who had been for several years a teacher in Canton, Stark county, Ohio, he began his law practice in that place, which was to be his permanent home. He identified himself immediately with the Republican party, campaigned in the Democratic county of Stark in favour of negro suffrage in 1867, and took part in the campaign work on behalf of Grant's presidential candidature in 1868. In the following year he was elected prosecuting attorney on the Republican ticket; in 1871 he failed of re-election by 45 votes, and again devoted himself to his profession, while not relaxing his interest in politics.

In 1875 he first became known as an able campaign speaker by his speeches favouring the resumption of specie payments, and in behalf of Rutherford B. Hayes, the Republican candidate for governor of Ohio. In 1876 he was elected by a majority of 3304 to the national House of Representatives. Conditions both in Ohio and in Congress had placed him, and were to keep him for twenty years, in an attitude of aggressive and uncompromising partisanship. His Congressional district was naturally Democratic, and its boundaries were changed two or three times by Democratic legislatures for the purpose of so grouping Democratic strongholds as to cause his defeat. But he overcame what had threatened to be adverse majorities on all occasions from 1876 to 1890, with the single exception of 1882, when, although he received a certificate of election showing that he had been re-elected by a majority of 8, and although he served nearly through the long session of 1883-1884, his seat was contested and taken (May 28, 1884) by his Democratic opponent, Jonathan H. Wallace. McKinley reflected the strong sentiment of his manufacturing constituency in behalf of a high protective tariff, and he soon became known in Congress (where he particularly attracted the attention of James G. Blaine) as one of the most diligent students of industrial policy and question affecting national taxation. In 1878 he took part in the debates over the Wood Tariff Bill, proposing lower import duties; and in the same year he voted for the Bland-Allison Silver Bill. In December 1880 he was appointed a member of the Ways and Means committee, succeeding General James A. Garfield, who had been elected president in the preceding month, and to whose friendship, as to that of Rutherford B. Hayes, McKinley owed much in his earlier years in Congress. He was prominent in the debate which resulted in the defeat of the Democratic Morrison Tariff Bill in 1884, and, as minority leader of the Ways and Means committee, in the defeat of the Mills Bill for the revision of the tariff in 1887-1888. In 1889 he became chairman of the Ways and Means committee and Republican leader in the House of Representatives, after having been defeated by Thomas B. Reed on the third ballot in the Republican caucus for speaker of the House. On the 16th of April 1890 he introduced from the Ways and Means committee the tariff measure known commonly as the McKinley Bill, which passed the House on the 21st of May, passed the Senate (in an amended form, with a reciprocity clause, which McKinley had not been able to get through the House) on the 10th of September, was passed as amended, by the House, and was approved by the president on the 1st of October 1890. The McKinley Bill reduced revenues by its high and in many cases almost prohibitive duties; it put sugar on the free list with a discriminating duty of (1/10)th of one cent a pound on sugar imported from countries giving a bounty for sugar exported, and it gave bounties to American sugar growers; it attempted to protect many "infant" industries such as the manufacture of tin-plate; under its provision for reciprocal trade agreements (a favourite project of James G. Blaine, who opposed many of the "protective" features of the Bill) reciprocity treaties were made with Germany, France, Italy, and Belgium, which secured a market in those countries for American pork. Abroad, where the Bill made McKinley's name known everywhere, there was bitter opposition to it and reprisals were threatened by several European states. In the United States the McKinley Tariff Bill was one of the main causes of the Democratic victory in the Congressional elections of 1890, in which McKinley himself was defeated by an extraordinary Democratic gerrymander of his Congressional district. In November 1891 he was elected governor of Ohio with a plurality of more than 21,000 votes in a total of 795,000 votes cast. He was governor of Ohio in 1892-1895, being re-elected in 1893. His administration was marked by no important events, except that he had on several occasions in his second term to call out the militia of the state to preserve order; but it may be considered important because of the training it gave him in executive as distinguished from legislative work.