"Full Dinner Pail," a Republican campaign slogan in the 1900 presidential election campaign, used to emphasize the prosperity of William McKinley's first term and to appeal particularly to the labor vote. During McKinley's first term the nation pulled out of a serious depression and then waged a successful war against Spain in 1898. Despite these successes, the Republican Party's close association with big business and the growing radicalism of organized labor convinced McKinley that he needed to position himself as an ally of working-class America to be assured of reelection. His campaign strategy worked and in the November election he easily defeated William Jennings Bryan, the Democratic candidate.
Bibliography
Glad, Paul W. McKinley, Bryan, and the People. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1964.
—Wendell H. Stephenson/A. R.
