ble
passions aroused by four years of civil war, and President Garfield
to the revengeful vanity of a disappointed office-seeker. President
McKinley was killed by an utterly depraved criminal belonging to that
body of criminals who object to all governments, good and bad alike,
who are against any form of popular liberty if it is guaranteed by even
the most just and liberal laws, and who are as hostile to the upright
exponent of a free people's sober will as to the tyrannical and
irresponsible despot.

It is not too much to say that at the time of President McKinley's
death he was the most widely loved man in all the United States; while
we have never had any public man of his position who has been so wholly
free from the bitter animosities incident to public life. His political
opponents were the first to bear the heartiest and most generous tribute
to the broad kindliness of nature, the sweetness and gentleness of
character which so endeared him to his close associates. To a standard
of lofty integrity in public life he united the tender affections and
home virtues which are all-important in the make-up of national
character. A gallant soldier in the great war for the Union, he also
shone as an example to all our people because of his conduct in the most
sacred and intimate of home relations. There could be no personal hatred
of him, for he never acted with aught but consideration for the welfare
of others. No one could fail to respect him who knew him in public or
private life. The defenders of those murderous criminals who seek to
excuse their criminality by asserting that it is exercised for political
ends, inveigh against wealth and irresponsible power. But for this
assassination even this base apology cannot be urged.

President McKinley was a man of moderate means, a man whose stock sprang
from the sturdy tillers of the soil, who had himself belonged among the
wage-workers, who had entered the Army as a private soldier. Wealth was
not struck at when the President was assassinated, but the honest toil
which is content with moderate gains after a lifetime of unremitting
labor, largely in the service of the public. Still less was power struck
at in the sense that power is irresponsible or centered in the hands of
any one individual. The blow was not aimed at tyranny or wealth. It was
aimed at one of the strongest champions the wage-worker has ever had; at
one of the most faithful representatives of the system of p