He's The Persuader
Kevin Phillips loves William McKinley. That much is clear. It is doubtless. It is akin to June, fair "bustin' out all over". Our biographer, one of the more thorough compilers in good Mr. Schlesinger's series, "The American Presidents", is smitten. Head over heels. He shouts it from the rooftops. Proclaims it from the valleys. Kevin Phillips is sittin' in a tree. Mc-K-I-N-L-E-Y.
Yes. The dedication to subject is real, and very personal. Unlike some biographers in Arthur Schlesinger's pantheon, Phillips is a believer. He doesn't apologize for the manners of the 19th Century (Henry F. Graff, "Grover Cleveland", 2002), nor roundly condemn (Jean H. Baker, "James Buchanan", 2004), neither is he a-lawyering to get a much-maligned figure off the hook (John W. Dean, "Warren G. Harding", 2004). Phillips is a standard bearer. Almost a ring bearer. To the author, our 25th President was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Maybe the wheel.
If one peruses even current children's literature on the subject, William McKinley is made a Santa Claus, a very nice man sweetly "harrumph"ing, the sort one sees handing out Tollhouse cookies at a church function. This is well, for even in a postmodern world, every child requires heroes. Adults of Watergate and beyond are not allowed this, or do not allow themselves and each other. No, if there is filth, and of necessity there must be, find it, dredge it up, and be quick about it! Spread the wampum of corruption for all to see! Find the dark underbelly, scream its ugliness, then move on to throwing rocks at the next bandwagon. Kevin Phillips doesn't cop to this. He gives us a hero, by his estimation, an adult one from a remarkable, gear-shifting era. He gives us--impossibly--a good man.
William McKinley (the Phillips Translation), is the idea man, the groundbreaker, the rolled-up shirtsleeves building the erector set of Teddy Roosevelt's America. If we thank TR, grinning back at Mount Rushmore and thinking big stick thoughts, the author would remind us who put him there; likely, if not for bullets from an assassin's pistol, the stone arrangement high in SD's Black Hills would look quite different today.
McKinley is shown us at fast times Reaganesque, surrounding himself with capable others as he kept one ear to the ground. He is portrayed as a man carefully positioning himself while at the same time actually getting a few things done. Romantic in places: McKinley waved out the window in the direction of the First Lady's sickroom, every day at 3; questionable to even a minimally cynical mind: our 25th Chief Executive, friend of immigrants and the miners? Yes. Though ladled on with a shovel, thanks to a research one does not encounter evenly in "The American Presidents", a pleasing pol emerges from Phillips' bio, one even this writer would have been proud to support (that said, I'd have voted for William Jennings Bryan, both times). William McKinley, wrongly cast among the "caretaker presidents", was a workhorse, a solid governor (OH) and Senator, one who *worked* in his lofty capacity, and *did* the work. *A President*.
If Phillips exclaims too excitedly for us, 'tis perhaps but to counterbalance current Gen-X sensibilities, which would have us condemn The Past for not realizing its own Future preternaturally. The author knows his subject, who knew his times. Kevin Phillips loves William McKinley. He would have us do the same. It's difficult not to; Phillips makes his case.Read full review
