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public interest. Comparing its present position with that which it held in the last generation, or thirty years ago, great progress may be noted in the mechanical improvement of its issues, the extension of its sources of information, the breadth and importance of its discussions. It has generally outgrown one of its most odious early weaknesses, its occasional meddling with purely private affairs. Time was when malignants or seekers of notoriety of a certain class, instead of carrying their quarrels, their scandal, their professed injuries to the courts, would parade them in the newspapers of the day, with endless mutual accusations and recriminations, while the editors, like the gods in Homer, would descend from their pedestals to mingle in the affray. This license is now thought puerile and contemptible. A stricter interpretation of the law of libel, with its visitation of penalties has brought about a wholesome reform, and now if the reader seek defamation in his newspaper, in private interests at least, he must be content to receive it with its antidote, decently filtered through the legal reports.

The special causes or instruments of the improvement of the Press are to be sought for in the concentration of the newspaper interest in great enterprizes, requiring the employment of large capital, which brings with it a proportional responsibility; in the rapid multiplication of facts to be presented and topics discussed,—the greater inevitably crowding out the lessand in the development and elevation of national interests, consequent upon the gigantic war for the preservation of the Union. The Press that once spake as a child, in those days now forever departed, of thoughtless levity and vain glory, the untaxed youth of the nation, that "very merry, laughing, quaffing and unthinking time," must now consider manly things. The war has made the nation old in a day. She is no longer the spoilt and petted child of fortune, but is married to fate and experience and must take her place in the battle of existence with the scarred historic veterans of the old world.

In a secondary way, the scientific improvements and inventions of the day have had much to do in moulding the character of the press. Of these it is sufficient to allude to the employment of the land and ocean magnetic telegraphs, in gathering information from the whole world almost on the instant, to a particular centre, and the use and economy of the cylinder steam press in multiplying copies by thousands, instead of by hundreds, for circulation. The Atlantic telegraph has virtually enforced independence upon the Press of America by anticipating and thus precluding the former free use of foreign editorials. The brief fact only is now furnished, the text of the discourse: the editor must supply the argument or preach the sermon by his own powers. He is compelled to think for himself and his readers. Coupling this with the rapid increase of home topics of importance, the result is a complete emancipation from the old subservience to European notions or opinions. Formerly foreign interests took the lead; they now Occupy a secondary place with our native journalists, who attend to the paramount business of the nation, once happily defined by Miss Martineau as "world making.”.

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THE FOLLOWING TABLES GIVE THE VOTE OF EACH STATE IN THE UNION BY COUNTIES, FOR
PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES AT EACH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION FROM 1836 TO 1868;
ALSO, THE POPULAR VOTE OF EACH STATE IN 1868.

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| No. of Co.

COUNTIES.

Grant, Seymour, Lincoln, McClellan, Lincoln, Fusion, Buchanan, Fillmore, Republican Democrat.Republican Democrat. Republican Democrat.

Democrat American.

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41,609 32,543 8,030 35,125 39.880 11,596 34,342 45,722 4,836 46,612 46,201 15,239 22.902 9,066

82,182

11,880

84.900

411

92.813

7.663 38.141

4,755

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1852.

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Dem.

Whig. Free Soil

Taylor, Cass,
Whig. Dem.

V Buren,
Free Soil

Clay, Polk,
Whig. Dem.

Birney,
Pree Soil

Harrison V Buren, Harrison Buren,
Whig. Dein. Whig- Dem.

1. 1,837

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2 1.825

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3 2,264 2,063

693

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4 1,491

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1,282

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4.286

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1,341 4.978 4,084 5.072

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29.997 16,147 6,695 14,781 27,763 7,560 17,866 27,160 4,161 26,153 32,761 13,850

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