Table II.
Preference of the Negro for Cotton.
| All Farmers in South |
Cotton Farmers. | Percentage of Cotton Farmers to Total. | |
| White farmers in south. | 1,869,721 | 531,333 | 28.4 |
| Negro""" | 734,362 | 527,969 | 71.9 |
As a rule, not without some exceptions, those counties in the south which have a large negro population are inferior in productiveness to those of similar natural quality in which the negro population is small. The productiveness of the farms of white farmers, north and south, is, with rare exceptions, greater per cultivated acre than the productiveness of lands cultivated by negro farmers.[1] The fairest basis of comparison is the productiveness of share farmers of the two races; for in this class practically all the management and all the labor are done by the farmer and his own family. Not only do the financial limitations and the small fields of share farmers preclude them from hiring labor, but whites will not work for negro farmers, nor will the negro, if he can avoid it, work for the small white farmer,
Table III.
Productivity of Farms per Improved Acre by Tenure and by Race of Farmer.
- ↑ The figures of the twelfth census are arranged in such a way as to conceal the shortcomings of the negro farmer, though there was doubtless no intention of producing such a result.
- ↑ The census tables giving production of farms of various tenures divide population into 'white' and 'colored.' In some states the number of Chinese farmers is so great as to make anything more than a mere approximation of production by negro farmers of various tenures possible; therefore I did not attempt it, but took the productivity of negro farmers of all tenures as given in a separate table.
- ↑ A large portion of the rich river bottoms are share-farmed to negroes.
