McKinley overwhelmingly captured the 1896 Republican nomination for the presidency, defeating Thomas B. Reed of Maine, Levi P. Morton of New York, Matthew Quay of Pennsylvania, and William B. Allison from Iowa. Reed was the Speaker of the House, Morton was the governor of New York as well as President Benjamin Harrison’s former vice president, Quay and Allison were United States senators. McKinley captured more than 660 votes, while Reed—the next closest—garnered just more than eighty votes.