The Democrats countered with their best spokesmen on tariff issues.[68] McKinley tirelessly stumped his new district, reaching out to its 40,000 voters to explain that his tariff

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was framed for the people ... as a defense to their industries, as a protection to the labor of their hands, as a safeguard to the happy homes of American workingmen, and as a security to their education, their wages, and their investments ... It will bring to this country a prosperity unparalleled in our own history and unrivalled in the history of the world."[69]

Democrats ran a strong candidate in former lieutenant governor John G. Warwick. To drive their point home, they hired young partisans to pretend to be peddlers, who went door to door offering 25-cent tinware to housewives for 50 cents, explaining the rise in prices was due to the McKinley Tariff. In the end, McKinley lost by 300 votes, but the Republicans won a statewide majority and claimed a moral victory.[70]

Governor of Ohio (1892–1896)
Even before McKinley completed his term in Congress, he met with a delegation of Ohioans urging him to run for governor. 