Ten new sees were established between 1850 and 1860, and eight of these were in the North or West—viz., Erie, Newark, Burlington, Portland, Fort Wayne, Sault St. Marie, Alton, and Brooklyn. Two were in the South—Covington and Natchitoches. There were thus in the United States, in 1860, forty-three bishoprics, with 2,235 priests. Let us now see how many Catholics were embraced in these dioceses, and what proportion they bore to the total population.
The number of the faithful it is not easy to determine accurately; for a false delicacy prevents the Americans from including the statistics of religious belief in their census-tables. Estimates are very variable. A work printed at Philadelphia in 1858 by a Protestant author sets down the number of Catholics as 3,177,140. Dr. Baird, a Protestant minister, published at Paris in 1857 an essay on religion in the United States—an essay, be it remarked, which showed the Catholics no favor—in which he estimated their number at 3,500,000. But neither of these estimates rests upon trustworthy data. They were certainly below the truth when they were made, and are therefore far from large enough now, for the yearly increase is very great.
Our own calculations are drawn partly from our personal observation, and partly from official documents published by various ecclesiastical authorities. The best criterion is undoubtedly the rate of increase of the clergy.
It must be evident that in America, more than in any other country, there is a logical relation between the number of the faithful and the number of the priests. As the clergy depend entirely upon the voluntary contributions of their people, there must be a fixed ratio between the growth of the flocks and the multiplication of pastors. If the clergy increase too fast, they endanger their means of support. Now, if priests cannot live in America without a certain number of parishioners to support them, we may take this number as a basis for calculating the minimum of the Catholic population; and we may safely say that the population will be in reality much greater than this minimum; because, as we can testify from experience, the churches never lack congregations, and in most places the number of the clergy is insufficient to supply even the most pressing religious wants of the people. One never sees a priest in the United States seeking for employment. On the contrary, the cry of spiritual destitution daily goes up from parishes and communities which have no pastors.
Calculations founded upon the statistics of "church accommodations" given in the United States census—that is, of the number of persons the churches are capable of holding—are not applicable to our case; because the Catholic churches, especially in the large cities, are thronged two or three times every Sunday by as many distinct congregations, while the Protestant churches have only one service for all. The capacity of the churches therefore gives us neither the actual number of worshippers nor the proportion between our own people and those of other denominations. We have taken, then, as the basis of our estimate, the ratio between the number of priests and the number of the faithful, correcting the result according to the circumstances of particular places. The first point is to establish this ratio, and we are led by the concurrent results of careful estimates made in some of the States, and special or general calculations which we have had opportunity of making in person, to fix it at the average of one priest for every 2,000 Catholics. But we have a very trustworthy method of verifying this estimate, and that is by comparison between the United States and the contiguous British Provinces, in which the statistics of religious belief are included in the general census. Setting aside Lower Canada, where the Catholic population is as compact as it is in France, we find that in Upper [{8}] Canada, a country which resembles the Western United States, the ratio in 1860 was one priest for every 1,850 Catholics, and in New Brunswick, a territory very like New England, one for every 2,400. Our average ratio of one for every 2,000 cannot, therefore, be far from the truth. We have made due account of all data by which this ratio could be either raised or lowered in particular times and places. We have ourselves made investigations in certain districts, and persons well qualified to speak on the subject have given us information about others. The result of our corrected calculation gives us 4,400,000 as the Catholic population of the United States in 1860, the date of the last general census. We shall give presently the distribution of this total among the several states; but we wish first to call attention to another fact of great importance which appears from our figures. In 1808 the Catholics were 100,000 in a total population of 6,500,000, or 1/65th of the whole; in 1830 they were 450,000 in 13,000,000, or 1/29th of the whole; in 1840, 960,000 in 17,070,000, or 1/18th; in 1850, 2,150,000 in 23,191,000, or 1/11th; and finally, in 1860 they were over 4,400,000 in 31,000,000, or 1/7th of the total population. It thus appears that for fifty years the Catholics have increased much faster than the rest of the inhabitants, and especially during the last two decades. Between 1840 and 1850 their ratio of increase was 125 per cent., while that of the whole population was only 36; and from 1850 to 1860 their ratio of increase was 109 per cent., while that of the whole people was 35.59. These figures, to be sure, are not mathematically certain, for they are deduced partly from estimates; but we are confident that, considering the imperfect materials at our disposal, we have come as near the exact truth as possible, both in the ratio of increase and in the total population. Official returns in the British Provinces confirm our calculations in a most remarkable manner; and we believe that, estimating the future growth on the most moderate scale, the Catholics will number in 1870 one-fifth of the whole population, and in 1900 not far from one-third.
II.
Having traced the progress of the Church step by step in the United States, it will now be equally interesting and instructive to see how this progress has been made in different places. The Catholics are by no means uniformly dispersed over the country, and their increase has not been equally rapid in all the states. It will be worth our while to see in which quarters they are settled with the most compactness and in which they are widely dispersed; and thus we may predict without great risk which regions are destined to be the Catholic strongholds in the New World. We have already said that the proportion of the Catholics to the whole people in 1860 was as one to seven; but if we divide the country into two parts we shall find that in the Southern states there are only 1,200,000 Catholics in a population of 12,000,000—that is, they are 1/10th of the whole; while in the North they number 3,200,000 in 19,000,000, or more than 1/6th. Even these figures give but a very general idea of the distribution of the faithful. If we take the whole country, state by state, we shall find the proportions still more variable. In some places the Catholic element is already so strong that its ultimate preponderance can hardly be doubted, while its slow development in other quarters promises little for the future. The following tables will enable our readers to comprehend at once the distribution of the Catholics among the various states:
NORTHERN STATES.
SOUTHERN STATES.
