Telegraphy and the 1880 Presidential Election

Interior of the Campaign Office

Library of Congress

During the nineteenth century, approximately 23,000 miles of telegraph wires carried messages via Morse code across the country. At a time when most news traveled by word of mouth or letter, it is difficult to understate what a tremendous technological achievement the telegraph was. Near-instantaneous news delivered via electric wire could and did alter history.

Developed in the late eighteenth century, the telegraph became an increasingly important device by the mid-nineteenth century. It changed the course of battles during the American Civil War where generals were able to coordinate with their battlefield commanders in real time.

The electric telegraph was revolutionary in its design. It utilized an electronic pulse, sent across conductive wires at high speed which produced a sound on the receiving end with an electrified magnet. The adoption of Morse code, a simplified alphabet of “dashes” and “dots” in the mid 1880s, made the process of transcribing messages even faster.

As with any invention for communicating quickly to a wide array of people, the telegraph quickly became integral to politics. So it was during the election of 1880. As part of his campaign preparation, Garfield’s humble library became a telegraphic office, one of the only in the village of Mentor. There, he had two telegraph sets, both monitored by the same clerk, O. L. Judd, who would transcribe telegraphic messages for Garfield’s secretary, Joseph Stanley-Brown. Stanley-Brown would then dictate messages in reply.

Without having to wait for a letter to arrive, and several years before the widespread adoption of Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone (which had just been patented in 1876), the near instant communication of the telegraph kept James A. Garfield and his staffers in the campaign office informed of all the latest developments when voting precincts across the country began reporting their election results. Garfield received the news of his victory in the state of New York at around 11pm on election night via telegraph.