William McKinley

     Just after Wool Markets and Sheep for Sept. 15 went to press came the sad news that President McKinley had succumbed to the “Grim Reaper” from the effects of the wounds made by the assassin, who today sits in the Buffalo jail convicted of murder, although his awful crime is something worse than mere murder, for when he fired the shots that cut down our beloved President in the full glory of his manhood he struck at the very heart of the nation.
     Mere words fail when we try to say what William McKinley was to this nation. Coming from the ranks of what Lincoln called the “great plain people,” he, by his own unaided energy and industry, gained the highest place that any man in the world can be called to fill, for the President of the United States is the most powerful ruler on earth.
     That a man born among the lowly can climb to the highest peak that ambition offers to the aspiring, and at the same time never commit any act that lays him open to condemnation, never sully the highest ideal of manhood, never go beyond the limits of the Christian religion, all the time living a life open to the whole people, shows that success does not depend on sharp practice nor high position nor underhanded efforts.
     The life of McKinley will serve as a model for all the generations of aspiring young men who may come on the stage of human action hereafter. His life was an open book, his every success was attained by honorable means, his high position at the time of his death was due solely and alone to his merits.
     Sheep breeders and wool growers had in William McKinley their best friend and most successful champion. The American policy, of which he was the greatest exponent, is the foundation upon which the sheep industry of this country has been built up. Every time this policy has been departed from by the government sheep-breeding and wool-growing has been affected in a disastrous manner. In his capacity as chairman of the ways and means committee, he formulated the greatest and best tariff law we have ever had. The moment it was repealed the value of the sheep industry of this country was almost swept out of existence. When the party that believes in protection was again in power the sheep business began to improve and the whole commercial fabric of the country put on new life. The power of his example, the corectness [sic] of his economical creed, the momentum the nation has gained under his grand administration will not be lost, although he is gone from among us forever. We have reason to believe the policy he mapped out for himself will be carried forward in the minutest detail. Our nation is too great to fall back even when its greatest man drops the reins of government and lays down his authority in conformity with the mandate of that stern reaper—Death.
     Not only our nation, but all the nations of earth mourn his untimely end. To him princes and kings sent messages of sympathy, and the nations of the world put on the garb of sorrow for his loss. No man who ever lived had greater honors paid him after death. For him the business of the nation stopped and the whole people mourned for some solemn minutes, while the wheels of commerce stood silent and the engines that drive the factories of a nation were idle. His life was inspiring, his death that of a Christian who could willingly bow to the will of God and—

“Gather about him the draperies of his couch
     And lie down to pleasant dreams.”

     In the dying words of President McKinley, “It is God’s way; His will be done.” No man ever lived a greater life; no man ever died more triumphantly.