WMPortrait comingOfficial portrait of William McKinley
25th president of the United States · 1897–1901 and 1901–1901

William McKinley

RepublicanVice president: Garret Hobart (1897–99), Theodore Roosevelt (1901)Assassinated September 1901

This presidency falls in the realignment era (1896–1932), when the two parties were trading positions and both had progressive and conservative wings.

Won in 1896 on the gold standard and high tariffs. He signed the Dingley Tariff, which raised rates to record levels, led the country through the Spanish–American War in 1898, and took Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines, where U.S. troops then fought a long war against Filipino independence forces. He annexed Hawaii and signed the Gold Standard Act. He was shot in Buffalo six months into his second term.

Debt added
+$373.49million
$1.77 billion → $2.14 billion (+21%)
Debt-to-GDP, latest
9.3%
FY1896: 11% → FY1900: 10% · FY1900: 10% → FY1901: 9.3%
Unemployment
2.4%
1897: 14.5% → 1901: 2.4%
Average inflation
0.0%a year
1896–1900: 0.0% a year · 1900–1901: 1.2% a year
Executive orders
185
About 41 a year in office
Pardons & commutations
414
291 pardons · 123 commutations (fiscal 1900–01 only)
Impeached
No
No · Convicted of a crime: No

The economy, first day to last

Shaded areas show the years in office, with a few years before and after for comparison. Budget years ran July to June until 1976 (now October to September), so each year's figures cover parts of two calendar years.

National debt

June 30, 1896 (end of fiscal 1896): $1.77 billion → June 30, 1901 (end of fiscal 1901): $2.14 billion

Daily debt figures don't exist before 1993, so McKinley's numbers use the fiscal years closest to his terms, the same rule as every other page. Most of the rise paid for the Spanish–American War.

Debt compared with the economy

Debt as a share of GDP. Above 100% means the debt is bigger than a year of everything the country produces.

Deficits and surpluses

Money borrowed each budget year (below the line) or paid down (above). The White House budget office's yearly figures begin in 1901.

DeficitSurplus

Unemployment

1897: 14.5% → 1901: 2.4%. Yearly averages; monthly figures begin in 1948. Estimates by economist Stanley Lebergott.

Inflation

How much prices rose each year (consumer price index).

Cost of living

What everyday prices and paychecks did while in office.

What cost $100 in 1896$100.00 in 1900
What cost $100 in 1900$101.23 in 1901

Prices use the consumer price index (MeasuringWorth). The minimum wage is the federal rate set by Congress.

Executive orders

185 orders. Count from the American Presidency Project.

Orders signed each year

Yearly counts aren't reliable for this era. Orders were not numbered until 1907, when the State Department numbered the ones already in its files, and many orders were never numbered at all, so only the total is shown.

Source: American Presidency Project: executive orders (full list of every order).

Notable orders

Rolling back the civil serviceOrderMay 29, 1899

Removed about 4,000 federal jobs from civil service rules, letting them be filled by patronage again.

Federal Register
Every executive order we have 117Search, filter by topic or year, and open any order's full text

Incomplete: orders before 1929 were not numbered or collected consistently. This archive has 117 of the roughly 185 orders counted for this president.

  1. OrderMarch 28, 1898Executive Order
  2. OrderMay 7, 1898Executive Order
  3. OrderMay 19, 1898Executive Order
  4. OrderMay 19, 1898Executive Order
  5. OrderMay 19, 1898Executive Order
  6. OrderJuly 4, 1898Executive Order
  7. OrderJuly 8, 1898Executive Order
  8. OrderJuly 13, 1898Executive Order
  9. OrderJuly 16, 1898Executive Order
  10. OrderJuly 21, 1898Executive Order
  11. OrderJuly 27, 1898Executive Order
  12. OrderAugust 6, 1898Executive Order
  13. OrderAugust 6, 1898Executive Order
  14. OrderAugust 17, 1898Executive Order
  15. OrderAugust 21, 1898Executive Order
  16. OrderAugust 21, 1898Executive Order
  17. OrderDecember 4, 1898Executive Order
  18. OrderDecember 9, 1898Executive Order
  19. OrderDecember 21, 1898Executive Order
  20. OrderDecember 21, 1898Executive Order
  21. OrderDecember 22, 1898Executive Order
  22. OrderDecember 22, 1898Executive Order
  23. OrderJanuary 1, 1899Executive Order
  24. OrderJanuary 20, 1899Executive Order
  25. OrderJanuary 31, 1899Executive Order
  26. OrderFebruary 3, 1899Executive Order
  27. OrderApril 1, 1899Executive Order
  28. OrderApril 1, 1899Executive Order
  29. OrderApril 1, 1899Executive Order
  30. OrderApril 3, 1899Executive Order
  31. OrderApril 6, 1899Executive Order
  32. OrderMay 6, 1899Executive Order
  33. OrderMay 6, 1899Executive Order
  34. OrderMay 10, 1899Executive Order
  35. OrderMay 13, 1899Executive Order
  36. OrderMay 23, 1899Executive Order
  37. EO 119May 29, 1899Amendments to the Civil-Service Rules
  38. OrderJune 10, 1899Executive Order
  39. OrderJune 16, 1899Executive Order
  40. OrderJune 27, 1899Executive Order
  41. OrderJuly 3, 1899Executive Order
  42. OrderJuly 3, 1899Executive Order
  43. OrderJuly 24, 1899Executive Order
  44. OrderAugust 17, 1899Executive Order
  45. OrderSeptember 2, 1899Executive Order
  46. OrderSeptember 11, 1899Executive Order
  47. OrderSeptember 18, 1899Executive Order
  48. OrderSeptember 29, 1899Executive Order
  49. OrderNovember 4, 1899Executive Order
  50. OrderNovember 10, 1899Executive Order
  51. OrderDecember 1, 1899Executive Order
  52. OrderJanuary 3, 1900Executive Order
  53. OrderJanuary 5, 1900Executive Order
  54. OrderJanuary 8, 1900Executive Order—Withdrawn Navajo Lands
  55. OrderJanuary 8, 1900Executive Order
  56. OrderJanuary 19, 1900Executive Order
  57. OrderFebruary 12, 1900Executive Order
  58. OrderMarch 7, 1900Executive Order
  59. OrderMarch 19, 1900Executive Order—Northern Cheyenne Reserve, Montana
  60. OrderMarch 19, 1900Executive Order—Establishment of Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation
  61. OrderMarch 20, 1900Executive Order
  62. OrderMarch 21, 1900Executive Order
  63. OrderMay 1, 1900Executive Order
  64. OrderMay 14, 1900Executive Order—Hualpai (Walapai) Reserve, Arizona
  65. OrderMay 14, 1900Executive Order—Expansion of Hualapai Indian School Reserve
  66. OrderMay 26, 1900Executive Order
  67. OrderMay 26, 1900Executive Order
  68. OrderJune 12, 1900Executive Order
  69. OrderJune 22, 1900Executive Order
  70. OrderJune 27, 1900Executive Order
  71. OrderJune 29, 1900Executive Order
  72. OrderAugust 2, 1900Executive Order
  73. OrderAugust 2, 1900Executive Order
  74. OrderAugust 23, 1900Executive Order
  75. OrderSeptember 3, 1900Executive Order
  76. OrderSeptember 19, 1900Executive Order
  77. OrderSeptember 20, 1900Executive Order
  78. OrderOctober 10, 1900Executive Order
  79. OrderOctober 10, 1900Executive Order
  80. OrderOctober 13, 1900Executive Order
  81. OrderOctober 29, 1900Executive Order
  82. OrderNovember 30, 1900Executive Order
  83. OrderDecember 7, 1900Executive Order
  84. OrderDecember 13, 1900Executive Order
  85. OrderDecember 14, 1900Executive Order
  86. OrderDecember 19, 1900Executive Order
  87. OrderFebruary 2, 1901Executive Order
  88. OrderMarch 8, 1901Executive Order
  89. OrderMarch 9, 1901Executive Order
  90. OrderMarch 9, 1901Executive Order
  91. OrderMarch 11, 1901Executive Order
  92. OrderMarch 12, 1901Executive Order
  93. OrderMarch 14, 1901Executive Order
  94. OrderMarch 22, 1901Executive Order
  95. OrderMarch 25, 1901Executive Order
  96. OrderMarch 26, 1901Executive Order
  97. OrderMarch 30, 1901Executive Order
  98. OrderApril 2, 1901Executive Order
  99. OrderApril 5, 1901Executive Order
  100. OrderApril 6, 1901Executive Order
  101. OrderApril 15, 1901Executive Order
  102. OrderApril 23, 1901Executive Order
  103. OrderApril 29, 1901Executive Order
  104. OrderJune 7, 1901Executive Order
  105. OrderJune 7, 1901Executive Order
  106. OrderJune 10, 1901Executive Order
  107. OrderJune 21, 1901Executive Order
  108. OrderJune 21, 1901Executive Order
  109. OrderJune 21, 1901Executive Order
  110. OrderJune 25, 1901Executive Order
  111. OrderJune 25, 1901Executive Order
  112. OrderJune 29, 1901Executive Order
  113. OrderJuly 24, 1901Executive Order
  114. OrderAugust 19, 1901Executive Order
  115. OrderAugust 20, 1901Executive Order
  116. OrderAugust 27, 1901Executive Order
  117. OrderAugust 29, 1901Executive Order

Source: Executive Orders Archive, compiled from the American Presidency Project and the Federal Register. Topics are the archive's automated tags; "Revoked" and similar labels come from the Federal Register's records.

Pardons and commutations

A pardon wipes out the punishment for a federal crime; a commutation shortens a sentence but leaves the conviction. The Justice Department's published counts begin in fiscal 1900 (July 1899), so only his last two years are shown.

Granted each year

PardonsCommutations

Source: U.S. Dept. of Justice, clemency statistics, which lists every recipient with the crime and sentence.

Notable grants: tap to see the crime

No individual grants from this presidency are highlighted yet.

Controversies and scandals

What happened, what was proven, and how it ended.

Proven convicted, admitted or confirmed by a court or official investigationCharged indicted or impeached (outcome stated)Disputed facts established, whether it was wrong is debatedAlleged reported but never established
The Philippine–American WarProven1899–1902

After buying the Philippines from Spain, the U.S. fought Filipino forces seeking independence. About 4,200 U.S. soldiers and 20,000 Filipino fighters were killed, and at least 200,000 Filipino civilians died from violence, famine and disease. U.S. troops used torture, including the 'water cure'.

Outcome: A Senate committee held hearings on abuses in 1902, after McKinley's death.

Source
Annexing HawaiiDisputed1898

American businessmen had overthrown Hawaii's queen in 1893. When a treaty could not get two-thirds of the Senate, McKinley annexed the islands by a simple majority vote of both houses.

Outcome: Congress formally apologized to Native Hawaiians in 1993.

Source
The 'embalmed beef' scandalDisputed1898–1899

General Nelson Miles charged that canned and refrigerated beef supplied to troops in the war was chemically treated and made soldiers sick.

Outcome: A court of inquiry found the beef was poor but not chemically treated; Secretary of War Alger resigned amid the fallout.

Source
Silence on the Wilmington coupDisputedNovember 1898

White supremacists overthrew the elected, biracial government of Wilmington, North Carolina, killing dozens of Black residents. Black leaders appealed to McKinley, who did not intervene.

Outcome: No one was prosecuted; North Carolina's 2006 commission called it a coup.

Source
Record corporate money in 1896Disputed1896

Campaign manager Mark Hanna raised an estimated $3.5 million, much of it assessed from banks and corporations, which was legal at the time.

Outcome: Corporate contributions to federal campaigns were banned in 1907.

Source

In their own words

Widely quoted remarks, with the context they were said in.

There was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them.

November 1899 · As recalled in 1903 by a Methodist minister who was at the meeting; historians question the exact wording. Source

Expositions are the timekeepers of progress.

September 5, 1901 · Speech at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, the day before he was shot there. Source
How this page is made. Every president gets the same sections and the same checklist. A controversy is listed if it led to an investigation by Congress, an inspector general, a special or independent counsel or a court, or was a sustained national story covered across the political spectrum. Labels follow the strongest official finding, not media coverage. Debt figures come from the U.S. Treasury; deficits and GDP from the White House budget office and the Commerce Department; unemployment from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (before 1948, yearly estimates by Stanley Lebergott via NBER and the Census Bureau's Historical Statistics); prices from MeasuringWorth; executive orders from the Federal Register and National Archives; clemency from the Justice Department.