In 1892, Harding traveled to Washington, where he met Democratic Nebraska Congressman William Jennings Bryan, and listened to the "Boy Orator of the Platte" speak on the floor of the House of Representatives. Harding traveled to Chicago's Columbian Exposition in 1893. Both visits were without Florence. Democrats generally won Marion County's offices in 1895, and though Harding lost the election for county auditor, he did better than expected. The following year, Harding was one of many orators who traveled across Ohio in support of the campaign of the Republican presidential candidate William McKinley, that state's former governor. According to Dean, "while working for McKinley [Harding] began making a name for himself through Ohio".
