The expansion of the press in the late nineteenth century – Britain and America leading the way; Germany and other countries soon following – reinforced its self-proclaimed role as representative of the public. Politicians could no longer ignore newspapers and needed to (appear to) take into account public opinion. However, sensitivity to news related to the security of a political position: monarchs remained most shielded from public opinion and the press, followed by non-elected insiders, non-elected outsiders, elected insiders, and elected outsiders. Both journalists and politicians posited that ‘the press’ shaped the parameters of political manoeuvrability and provided politicians with the daily information needed to perform their duties. Politicians’ choice of newspapers, seen to affect their decisions, became subject to debate in newspapers themselves. Politicians were portrayed as bourgeois readers, reinforcing their participation in an imagined community of readership that developed in this period, particularly in the major urban centres. Despite the expectation to heed the voice of the people, journalists also expected politicians to stand above the clamour of the press and to lead public opinion in pursuit of national interests. In response to these contradictory expectations, politicians increasingly sought to steer the press themselves.