Library of CongressLeon Czolgosz shoots President McKinley with a concealed revolver in this 1905 drawing, “Assassination of President McKinley,” by T. Dart Walker.Historic Headlines
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On Sept. 6, 1901, Leon Czolgosz stepped from a crowd at the World’s Fair in Buffalo and, using a revolver hidden under his handkerchief, fired two shots at President William McKinley, who died eight days later.
As the Sept. 6 New York Times described it, “There was an instant of almost complete silence, like the hush that follows a clap of thunder. The President stood stock still, a look of hesitancy, almost of bewilderment, on his face. Then he retreated a step while a pallor began to steal over his features. The multitude seemed only partially aware that something serious had happened.”
Mr. Czolgosz immediately wrote a confession for police in which he stated that he was an anarchist, though he was not a member of any particular organization. Anarchists then were known for political and labor violence, particularly in Europe, where they were responsible for a number of assassinations.
Mr. Czolgosz was motivated by what he saw as the exploitation of America’s working poor by the wealthy. He said he killed McKinley because, “I didn’t believe one man should have so much service,
and another man have none.”
Convicted after a two-day trial during which he made no attempt to defend himself, Mr. Czolgosz received the death penalty and was executed by electric chair on Oct. 29, 1901, less than two months after killing President McKinley.
Connect to Today:
In January 2011, Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords survived an assassination attempt. Immediately after the shooting, before the identity of the gunman was known, many in the media speculated that the gunman was motivated by right-wing rhetoric to kill Ms. Giffords, a Democratic, .
Though it was later revealed that the shooter was mentally unstable and not motivated by mainstream politics, the shooting inspired debate over whether inflammatory rhetoric can inspire political violence. In a Room for Debate discussion in The New York Times , Columbia University history professor Steven Mintz looked back at assassination attempts through American history.
Who are the individuals who have attempted to murder national leaders?” he asked. “Were they mostly alienated, psychotic misfits, living on the margins of society and craving publicity? Or were they sometimes rational individuals with clearly defined political goals? In general, presidential assailants have been outsiders, unusually sensitive to the political cults or sensations of the time. … A majority had ideological motives for their crimes but suffered from a paranoid style of thinking and chose their victim almost at random.
Leon Czolgosz fits within the archetype presented by Mr. Mintz: he was a loner who was inspired to kill President McKinley by anarchist speeches and literature. His crime brought about a crackdown on anarchism in the U.S. and the arrest of Emma Goldman, whose speech drew Mr. Czolgosz to anarchism.
Do you believe that violent rhetoric can cause political violence? If violence is committed in the name of a political philosophy, is it fair to hold those who espoused those views responsible? Looking back at famous assassination attempts in U.S. history, do you believe they are the results of the assassins’ political views or of their impaired mental health?
What convinces an assassin that he’s a national hero? How does one man, out of so many millions who might share similar political beliefs and passions, conclude that it is his destiny to commit murder for the greater good? For more context for this question, see this September 2010 blog post by Mark Moran of our partner organization, findingDulcinea.
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