William McKinley Quotes
I am a tariff man standing on a tariff platform.
William McKinley, 1843-1901, 25th President of the United States (Republican, OH), Quoted in Wallechinsky and Wallace, The Peoples' Almanac, Doubleday, 1975
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Republicans at that time were adamant protectionists and were violently opposed to free trade. They made a total flip flop on free trade after the Second Word War when the industrial capacity of all of the major industrial nations except America was completely emaciated. America still had production and there was huge money to be made from being the only nation that could deliver goods to the world. Meanwhile Germany, France, England, and Italy, our largest competitors could hardly manufacture for their own needs and could not compete in the American market. So the American corporations then wanted to become free traders.
During Theodore Roosevelt's administration there was a movement for tariff reform. The Speaker advised against any change, and the President finally accepted his view:
William McKinley was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. McKinley was president during the Spanish–American War of 1898, raised protective tariffs to boost American industry, and rejected the expansionary monetary policy of free silver, keeping the nation on the gold standard.
