McKinley’s Use of Tobacco

     The question as to whether President McKinley’s suddenly enforced abstention from the use of cigars had any effect on his heart action has been discussed. One of the attending physicians says:
     “I think that is not true,” said the doctor.
     “We did speak at one time or another of allowing him to smoke, but that matter was not seriously considered, and he never was in a condition when the craving for a cigar could have been felt.
     “As to the effects upon his heart action from his abstention from tobacco, there is really nothing to say. If it had been the president’s custom to smoke twenty or thirty cigars a day, possibly some effect might have been noticed in his heart action by a sudden cessation of the use of tobacco; but he was a moderate smoker, three or four cigars a day was his average.”