



Produced by James Linden.  HTML version by Al Haines.








State of the Union Addresses of William McKinley



The addresses are separated by three asterisks: ***

Dates of addresses by William McKinley in this eBook:

  December 6, 1897
  December 5, 1898
  December 5, 1899
  December 3, 1900



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State of the Union Address
William McKinley
December 6, 1897

To the Senate and House of Representatives:

It gives me pleasure to extend greeting to the Fifty-fifth Congress,
assembled in regular session at the seat of Government, with many of whose
Senators and Representatives I have been associated in the legislative
service. Their meeting occurs under felicitous conditions, justifying
sincere congratulation and calling for our grateful acknowledgment to a
beneficent Providence which has so signally blessed and prospered us as a
nation. Peace and good will with all the nations of the earth continue
unbroken.

A matter of genuine satisfaction is the growing feeling of fraternal regard
and unification of all sections of our country, the incompleteness of which
has too long delayed realization of the highest blessings of the Union. The
spirit of patriotism is universal and is ever increasing in fervor. The
public questions which now most engross us are lifted far above either
partisanship, prejudice, or former sectional differences. They affect every
part of our common country alike and permit of no division on ancient
lines. Questions of foreign policy, of revenue, the soundness of the
currency, the inviolability of national obligations, the improvement of the
public service, appeal to the individual conscience of every earnest
citizen to whatever party he belongs or in whatever section of the country
he may reside.

The extra session of this Congress which closed during July last enacted
important legislation, and while its full effect has not yet been realized,
what it has already accomplished assures us of its timeliness and wisdom.
To test its permanent value further time will be required, and the people,
satisfied with its operation and results thus far, are in no mind to
withhold from it a fair trial.

Tariff legislation having been settled by the extra session of Congress,
the question next pressing for consideration is that of the currency.

The work of putting our finances upon a sound basis, difficult as it may
seem, will appear easier when we recall the financial operations of the
Government since 1866. On the 30th day of June of that year we had
outstanding demand liabilities in the sum of $728,868,447.41. On the 1st of
January, 1879, these liabilities had been reduced to $443,889,495.88. Of our
interest-bearing obligations, the figures are even more striking. On July
1, 1866, the principal of the interest-bearing debt of the Government was
$2,332,331,208. On the 1st day of July, 1893, this sum had been reduced to
$585,137,100, or an aggregate reduction of $1,747,294,108. The
interest-bearing debt of the United States on the 1st day of December,
1897, was $847,365,620. The Government money now outstanding (December 1)
consists of $346,681,016 of United States notes, $107,793,280 of Treasury
notes issued by authority of the law of 1890, $384,963,504 of silver
certificates, and $61,280,761 of standard silver dollars.

With the great resources of the Government, and with the honorable example
of the past before us, we ought not to hesitate to enter upon a currency
revision which will make our demand obligations less onerous to the
Government and relieve our financial laws from ambiguity and doubt.

The brief review of what was accomplished from the close of the war to
1893, makes unreasonable and groundless any distrust either of our
financial ability or soundness; while the situation from 1893 to 1897 must
admonish Congress of the immediate necessity of so legislating as to make
the