Page 70 - Information and American Democracy Technology in the Evolution of Political Power

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The Rise of Majoritarianism
and that it then doubled again by 1840. 46 Frank Luther Mott estimates
there were 200 newspapers in business in 1801 and 1,200 by 1833, and
Michael Schudsen reports that newspaper circulation itself quadrupled
between 1830 and 1840 – a time when the total population of the nation
grew by one-third. 47 Mott cites an enthusiastic article in an 1836 issue
of the Philadelphia Public Ledger, a penny paper, about the presence of
newspapers in American life by the mid-1830s:

In the cities of New York and Brooklyn, containing a population of
300,000, the daily circulation of the penny papers is not less than
70,000. This is nearly sufficient to place a newspaper in the hands
of every man in the two cities, and even of every boy old enough to
read. These papers are to be found in every street, lane, and alley; in
every hotel, tavern, counting-house, shop, etc. Almost every porter
and dray-man, while not engaged in his occupation, may be seen
with a paper in his hands. 48
The scale and reach of American news, like that of mail, was revolution-
ized in the years leading up to 1840.
Thesedevelopmentsininfrastructurewerelinked,sinceacentralfunc-
tion of the newly muscular post office was the distribution of newspa-
pers. In fact, as Tim Cook observes, the post office was “geared more for
the prompt, widespread delivery of news than for individual correspon-
dence.” 49 During this period of transformation, the post office carried
roughly as many newspapers as letters, and in some years more. In 1830,
the nation’s post offices handled 16 million newspapers and a little un-
50
der 14 million letters. In the cities, newspaper delivery was conducted
chiefly by hand carriers, but in the rural areas where most people lived,
it depended on mail service.
Existing public policy nourished the newspaper business and its con-
nectiontothepostalservice.In1792,theU.S.Congresspassedwhatmight
be called the first “information infrastructure policy,” the Post Office Act,
linking together what would now be called “content providers” with the
sole national “service provider.” The act provided for the free exchange of

46 S. D. N. North, The Newspaper and Periodical Press (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Govern-
ment Printing Office, 1884), cited in Fang, A History of Mass Communication.
47 Mott, American Journalism; Schudson, Discovering the News.
48
Mott, American Journalism, p. 241.
49
Timothy E. Cook,Governing with the News: The News Media as a Political Institution
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998).
50
All figures on postal service capacity from John, Spreading the News.
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