William McKinley
William McKinley was the 25th President of the United States, serving from 1897 until his assassination in 1901, barely into his second term. His Vice President was Theodore Roosevelt.
Speech Relevance[edit]
McKinley is mentioned by Reagan in his CPAC speech, 'A City Upon a Hill':
Cartoonists with acid-tipped pens portray some of the reminders of our heritage and our destiny as old-fashioned. They say that we are trying to retreat into a past that actually never existed. Looking to the past in an effort to keep our country from repeating the errors of history is termed by them as "taking the country back to McKinley." Of course, I never found that was so bad — under McKinley we freed Cuba. On the span of history, we are still thought of as a young upstart country celebrating soon only our second century as a nation, and yet we are the oldest continuing republic in the world.
McKinley freed Cuba from Spain through the Spanish-American War.
