“The American farmer,” sententiously and truthfully remarks Professor Adams, “does not hoard his cash.” He gives no reason for the fact, and the determination must be left to the reader. “The American farmer,” he further remarks, “is, as a rule, his own landlord.” This statement reveals a very serious misapprehension of the facts. Something more than every third farm in the United States, according to the recent census, is operated by a tenant. Moreover, the proportion of tenants is constantly rising. For the whole country, tenants operated 25.5 per cent of all farms in 1880, 28.4 per cent in 1890, and 35.3 per cent in 1900. Further, the tendency is not confined to particular sections, but is common to the whole country. During the last decade the number of tenant-operated farms increased relatively to the whole number of farms in every State and Territory except Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire. In Maine tenantry decreased seven-tenths of 1 per cent, in New Hampshire five-tenths of 1 per cent, and in Vermont one-tenth of 1 per cent. For the twenty-year period, as was pointed out in Chapter II, the only exceptions to the general increase are Arizona, Florida, and New Hampshire.
The recent census, out of its abundant optimism, does not segregate these facts, and makes no general comment other than that tenantry has increased and that salaried management is believed to be “constantly increasing.” The bulletin on “Agriculture: The United States” does not even furnish a general classified summary of the data on tenantry. But the separate reports give the statistics, and out of them the following table is compiled:—
INCREASE OF FARM TENANTRY
| States and Territories | Per Cent of Farms operated by Tenants | |||
| 1880 | 1890 | 1900 | ||
| 1. | Alabama | 46.8 | 48.6 | 57.7 |
| 2. | Arizona | 13.2 | 7.9 | a.8.4[1] |
| b. 11.9[2] | ||||
| 3. | Arkansas | 30.9 | 32.1 | 45.4 |
| 4. | California | 19.8 | 17.8 | 23.1 |
| 5. | Colorado | 13.0 | 11.3 | 22.6 |
| 6. | Connecticut | 10.2 | 11.5 | 12.9 |
| 7. | Delaware | 42.4 | 46.9 | 50.3 |
| 8. | District of Columbia | 38.2 | 36.7 | 43.1 |
| 9. | Florida | 30.9 | 23.6 | 26.5 |
| 10. | Georgia | 44.9 | 53.5 | 59.9 |
| 11. | Idaho | 4.7 | 4.6 | 8.7 |
| 12. | Illinois | 21.4 | 24.0 | 29.3 |
| 13. | Indiana | 23.7 | 25.4 | 28.6 |
| 14. | Iowa | 23.8 | 28.1 | 34.9 |
| 15. | Kansas | 16.3 | 28.2 | 33.2 |
| 16. | Kentucky | 26.4 | 24.9 | 32.8 |
| 17. | Louisiana | 35.2 | 44.4 | 58.0 |
| 18. | Maine | 4.3 | 5.4 | 4.7 |
| 19. | Maryland | 31.0 | 31.0 | 33.6 |
| 20. | Massachusetts | 8.2 | 9.3 | 9.6 |
| 21. | Michigan | 10.0 | 14.0 | 15.9 |
| 22. | Minnesota | 9.2 | 12.9 | 17.3 |
| 23. | Mississippi | 43.8 | 52.8 | 62.4 |
| 24. | Missouri | 27.3 | 26.8 | 30.5 |
| 25. | Montana | 5.3 | 4.8 | 9.2 |
| 26. | Nebraska | 18.0 | 24.7 | 36.9 |
| 27. | Nevada | 9.7 | 7.5 | 11.4 |
| 28. | New Hampshire | 8.1 | 8.0 | 7.5 |
| 29. | New Jersey | 24.6 | 27.2 | 36.9 |
| 30. | New Mexico | 8.1 | 4.5 | 9.4 |
| 31. | New York | 16.5 | 20.2 | 23.9 |
| 32. | North Carolina | 33.5 | 34.1 | 41.4 |
| 33. | North Dakota | 3.9[3] | 6.9 | 8.5 |
| 34. | Ohio | 19.3 | 22.9 | 27.5 |
| 35. | Oklahoma | 0.7 | 21.0 | |
| 36. | Oregon | 14.1 | 12.5 | 17.8 |
| 37. | Pennsylvania | 21.2 | 23.3 | 26.0 |
| 38. | Rhode Island | 19.9 | 18.7 | 20.1 |
| 39. | South Carolina | 50.3 | 55.3 | 61.0 |
| 40. | South Dakota | 3.9[3] | 13.2 | 21.8 |
| 41. | Tennessee | 34.5 | 30.8 | 40.5 |
| 42. | Texas | 37.6 | 41.9 | 49.7 |
| 43. | Utah | 4.6 | 5.2 | 8.8 |
| 44. | Vermont | 13.4 | 14.6 | 14.5 |
| 45. | Virginia | 29.5 | 26.9 | 30.7 |
| 46. | Washington | 7.2 | 8.5 | 14.4 |
| 47. | West Virginia | 19.1 | 17.8 | 21.8 |
| 48. | Wisconsin | 9.1 | 11.4 | 13.5 |
| 49. | Wyoming | 2.8 | 4.2 | 7.6 |
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Including Indian farms.
[2] Excluding Indian farms.
[3] Dakota Territory.
There were 2,026,286 tenants in 1900, an increase in twenty years of 97.7 per cent. There were 3,713,371 owners, part owners, “owners and tenants,” and managers, an increase in twenty years of 24.4 per cent. During the twenty-year period owners in Washington increased less than fivefold, tenants tenfold. Utah shows a doubling of the number of owners, and a quadrupling of the number of tenants. South Dakota, compared with Dakota Territory in 1880, reveals an increase of owners of two and one-half times; of tenants, eighteen times. There are 28,669 fewer owners in New York State than in 1880, and 14,331 more tenants. Ownership has declined and tenantry advanced, both absolutely and relatively, in New Jersey. The great farming State of Illinois has 15,044 fewer owners and 23,454 more tenants than in 1880, and even the young Territory of Oklahoma, wherein one might expect to find evidences of increased ownership, reveals, for the ten-year period, a two-hundred-fold increase of tenantry and only a sixfold increase of ownership.