The State Journal-Register is the only local daily newspaper for Springfield, Illinois, and its surrounding area.

As such, it and its editor, Edward L. Baker, supported the political career of the Springfield-based Abraham Lincoln in the years before the American Civil War; in fact, it was in the Journal's office that Lincoln and his friends waited for the telegraphic news from Chicago to find out who would be the Republican presidential nominee in 1860.

In 1942, it bought Springfield's afternoon paper, the Illinois State Register.

[4][dubious – discuss] Fairport, New York–based GateHouse Media bought The State Journal-Register, along with most of Copley's other Midwestern titles, in 2007.

[5] In November 2019, GateHouse was merged with Gannett, forming the largest newspaper chain in the U.S.[6] Since the change in ownership, the paper has downsized its staff, leading to internal controversy and at least one editor resigning in protest.