Dingley Tariff Act

…he signed into law the Dingley Tariff, the highest protective tariff in American history to that time. Yet domestic issues would play only a minor role in the McKinley presidency. Emerging from decades of isolationism in the 1890s, Americans had already shown signs of wanting to play a more assertive…

Congress responded by passing the Dingley Tariff Act, which eliminated many items from the free list and generally raised duties on imports to the highest level they had yet reached.

…for the maintenance of the Dingley Tariff, instituted under McKinley in 1897; it was the highest protective tariff instituted in the United States up to that point. They cited the relative prosperity of the previous four years, using the campaign slogan “Four more years of the full dinner pail.” In…