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The Last Speech of William McKinley
Buffalo, New York, September 5, 1901
Expositions are the timekeepers of progress. They record the world's
advancement. They stimulate the energy, enterprise, and intellect of the
people; and quicken human genius. They go into the home. They broaden and
brighten the daily life of the people. They open mighty storehouses of
information to the student. Every exposition, great or small, has helped to
some onward step. Comparison of ideas is always educational; and as such
instructs the brain and hand of man. Friendly rivalry follows, which is the
spur to industrial improvement, the inspiration to useful invention and to high
endeavor in all departments of human activity. It exacts a study of the wants,
comforts, and even the whims of the people, and recognizes the efficacy of high
quality and new prices to win their favor. The quest for trade is an incentive
to men of business to devise, invent, improve and economize in the cost of
production. Business life, whether among ourselves or with other peoples, is
ever a sharp struggle for success. It will be none the less so in the future.
Without competition we should be clinging to the clumsy and antiquated
processes of farming and manufacture and the methods of business of long ago,
and the twentieth would be no further advanced than the eighteenth century.
But though commercial competitors we are, commercial enemies we must not be.
The Pan-American Exposition has done its work thoroughly, presenting in its
exhibits evidences of the highest skill and illustrating the progress of the
human family in the Western Hemisphere. This portion of the earth has no cause
for humiliation for the part it has performed in the march of civilization. It
has not accomplished everything; far from it. It has simply done its best, and
without vanity or boastfulness, and recognizing the manifold achievements of
others, it invites the friendly rivalry of all the powers in the peaceful
pursuits of trade and commerce, and will co-operate with all in advancing the
highest and best interests of humanity. The wisdom and energy of all the
nations are none too great for the world's work. The success of art, science,
industry, and invention is an international asset and a common glory. After
all, how near one to the other is every part of the world. Modern inventions
have brought into close relations widely separated peoples and made them better
acquainted. Geographic and politic divisions will continue to exist, but
distances have been effaced. Swift ships and fast trains are becoming
cosmopolitan. They invade fields which a few years ago were impenetrable. The
world's products are exchanged as never before, and with increasing
transportation facilities come increasing knowledge and larger trade.
Prices are fixed with mathematical precision by supply and demand. The world's
selling prices are regulated by market and crop reports. We travel greater
distances in a shorter space of time and with more ease than was ever dreamed
of by our fathers. Isolation is no longer possible or desirable. The same
important news is read, though in different languages, the same day in all
Christendom. The telegraph keeps us advised of what is occurring everywhere,
and the press foreshadows, with more or less accuracy, the plans and purposes
of the nations. Market prices of products and of securities are hourly known
in every commercial market, and the investments of people extend beyond their
own national boundaries into the remotest parts of the earth. Vast
transactions are conducted and international exchanges are made by the tick of
the cable. Every event of interest is immediately bulletined. The quick
gathering and transmission of news, like rapid transit, are of recent origin,
and are only made possible by the genius of the inventor and the courage of the
government, with every facility known at the time for rapid travel, nineteen
days to go from the city of Washington to New Orleans with a message to General
Jackson that the war with England had ceased and that a treaty of peace had
been signed. How different now.
We reached General Miles in Puerto Rico by cable, and he was able, through the
military telegraph, to stop his army on the firing line with the message that
the United States and Spain had signed a protocol suspending hostilities. We
knew almost instantly of the first shots fired at Santiago, and the subsequent
surrender of the Spanish forces was known at Washington within less than an
hour of its consummation. The first ship of Cervera's fleet had hardly emerged
from that historic harbor when the fact was flashed to our capital, and the
swift destruction that followed was announced immediately through the wonderful
medium of telegraphy. So accustomed are we to safe and easy communication with
distant lands that its temporary interruption, even in ordinary times, results
in loss and inconvenience. We shell never forget the days of anxious waiting
and awful suspense when no information was permitted to be sent from Peking and
the diplomatic representatives of the nations of China, cut off from all
communication, inside and outside of the walled capital, were surrounded by an
angry and misguided mob that thrilled the world when a single message from the
government of the United States brought, through our minister, the first news
of safety of the besieged diplomats.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century there was not a mile of steam
railroad on the globe. Now there are enough miles to make its circuit many
times. Then there was not a line of electric telegraph; now we have a vast
mileage traversing all lands and all seas. God and man have linked the nations
together. No nation can longer be indifferent to any other. And as we are
brought more and more in touch with each other, the less occasion is there for
misunderstandings, and the stronger the disposition, when we have differences,
to adjust them in court of arbitration, which is the noblest form for the
settlement of international disputes.
Trade statistics indicate that this country is in a state of unexampled
prosperity. The figures are almost appalling. They show that we are utilizing
our fields and forests and mines and that we are furnishing profitable
employment to the millions of workingmen throughout the United States, bringing
comfort and happiness to their homes and making it possible to lay by savings
for old age and disability. That all the people are participating in this
great prosperity is seen in every American community and shown by the enormous
and unprecedented deposits in our savings banks. Our duty is the care and
security of these deposits, and their safe investment demands the highest
integrity and the best business capacity of those in charge of these
depositories of the people's earnings.
We have a vast and intricate business, built up through years of toil and
struggle, in which every part of the country has its stake, which will not
permit of wither neglect, or of undue selfishness. No narrow, sordid policy
will subserve it. The greatest skill and wisdom on the part of manufacturers
and producers will be required to hold and increase it. Our industrial
enterprises which have grown to such great proportions affect the homes and
occupations of the people and the welfare of the country. Our capacity to
produce has developed so enormously and our products have so multiplied that
the problem of more markets requires our urgent and immediate attention. Only
a broad and enlightened policy will keep what we have. No other policy will
get more. In these times of marvelous business energy and gain we ought to be
looking to the future, strengthening the weak places in our industrial and
commercial systems, that we may be ready for any storm or strain. By sensible
trade arrangements which will not interrupt our home production, we shall
extend the outlets for our increasing surplus.
A system which provides a mutual exchange of commodities is manifestly
essential to the continued and healthful growth of our export trade. We must
not repose in fancied security that we can forever sell everything and buy
little or nothing. If such a thing were possible it would not be best for us
or those with whom we deal. We should take from our customers such of their
products as we can use without harm to our industries and labor. Reciprocity
is the natural outgrowth of our wonderful industrial development under the
domestic policy now firmly established. What we produce beyond our domestic
consumption must have a vent abroad. The excess must be relieved through a
foreign outlet, and we should sell anywhere we can and buy wherever the buying
will enlarge our sales and productions and thereby make a greater demand for
home labor. The period of exclusiveness is past. The expansion of our trade
and commerce is the pressing problem. Commercial wars are unprofitable. A
policy of good will and friendly trade relations will prevent reprisals.
Reciprocity treaties are in harmony with the spirit of the times; measures of
retaliation are not.
If perchance some of our tariffs are no longer needed for revenue or to
encourage and protect our industries at home, why would they not be employed to
extend and promote our markets abroad. Then, too, we have inadequate steamship
service. New lines of steamers have already been put in commission between the
Pacific coast ports of the United States and those on the western coast of
Mexico and South and Central America. These should be followed up with direct
steamship lines between the eastern coast of the United States and South
American ports. One of the needs of the times is direct commercial lines from
our vast fields of production to the fields of consumption that we have but
barely touched.
Next in advantage to having the thing to sell is to have the convenience to
carry it to the buyer. We must encourage our merchant marine. We must have
more ships. They must be under the American flag, built and manned and owned
by Americans. These will mot only be profitable in a commercial sense; they
will be messengers of peace and amity wherever they go. We must build the
Isthmian Canal, which will unite the two oceans and give a straight line of
water communication with the western coasts of Central and South America and
Mexico. The construction of a Pacific cable cannot be longer postponed.
In the furtherance of these objects of national interest and concern you are
performing an important part. This exposition would have touched the heart of
that American statesman whose mind was ever alert and thought ever constant for
a larger commerce and a truer fraternity of the republics of the New World.
His broad American spirit is felt and manifested here. He needs no
identification to an assemblage of Americans anywhere, for the name of Blaine
is inseparably associated with the Pan-American movement, which finds this
practical and substantial expression, and which we all hope will be firmly
advanced by the Pan-American Congress that assembles this autumn in the capital
of Mexico. The good work will go on. It cannot be stopped. These buildings
will disappear; this creation of art and beauty and industry will perish from
sight, but their influence will remain to
"Make it live beyond its short living,
With praises and thanksgiving."
Who can tell the new thoughts that have been awakened, the ambitions fired, and
the high achievements that will be wrought through this exposition? Let us
ever remember that our interest is in concord, not conflict; and that our real
eminence rests in the victories of peace, not those of war. We hope that all
who are represented here may be moved to a higher a nobler effort for their own
and the world's good, and that out of this city may come not only greater
commerce and trade for us all, but more essential than these, relations of
mutual respect, confidence and friendship which will deepen and endure. Our
prayer is that God will graciously vouchsafe prosperity, happiness, and peace
to all our neighbors, and like blessings to all the peoples and powers of the
earth.
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