It has been many years since I had the privilege of meeting an audience in the City of Salem, and I assure you that your greeting and welcome to-day give me very sincere pleasure.
You are here to celebrate a victory won, not by a single party, but by the people of all parties. I go back to my public duties at the capital encouraged by your confidence, but deeply conscious of the grave responsibilities which your action of yesterday imposes upon me. I can only ask of all my countrymen their sympathy and support. In the solution of the great problems that rest upon the United States, and I am sure that all of us will humbly petition the guidance of that Divine Ruler who has never failed this Government through all of its vicissitudes from its beginning to the present hour. I thank you and bid you good afternoon. [Tremendous applause and cheering.]
Source: "Ovation to the President, Large Crowds Greet Him on His Way to Washington, Makes Several Speeches from the Car Platform—Telegrams of Congratulation Received," New York Times, November 8, 1900, p. 1.
William McKinley, Remarks in Salem, Ohio Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/345950
