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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - IV. Economics - 12. New Blows to Southern Agriculture During the ’Thirties: Trends and Policies - 1. Agricultural Trends during the ’Thirties - 2. The Disappearing Sharecropper
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Chapter 12. New Blows to Southern Agriculture 253
although much more so in the North than in the South. The market for
all meats is booming.^^ There is a pronounced scarcity of agricultural labor
in the South as well as everywhere else. This new situation may, in a
measure, have some positive effects also on the long-range development.
The War probably has been a stimulus to greater crop diversification in the
South. The encouragement of out-migration from rural areas may make
agricultural over-population somewhat less severe even after the War than
would have been the case under other circumstances. But there are also
great risks in this development. When the results of the destruction in
Europe and elsewhere have been overcome, American agriculture will
again appear as over-expanded. The long-range employment prospects
in Southern agriculture, on the whole, are rather dark.
2. The Disappearing Sharecropper
Up to the time when the data from the 1940 Census were released, the
main emphasis in the discussion was placed upon the increase in tenancy
—
a trend which had been noticeable ever since the Civil War—and upon the
decline in number of farm owners—which became apparent during the
’twenties. The 1940 Census, however, showed that the trends had become
reversed. Tenancy was on the decline, for there were 192,000 fewer Negro
and 150,000 fewer white tenants in 1940 than in 1930. Ownership, on the
other hand, was on the increase in Southern agriculture, except for the
Negroes (Table i).
TABLE I
Number ok Farm Operators im the South, bv" Tenure and Color:
1930. 1935, and 1940
(in thousands)
Owners Tenants Other
and Managers than Croppers Croppers
Year Nonwhitc White Nonwhite White Nonwhite White
1930 i8j 1,250 306 709 393 383
193s 186 1,404 261 854 368 348
1940 174 1,384 000
700 299 242
Sourus: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Agriculture: /pj5. Vol. Ill, pp. zo6, Z07, and 136-133,
Sixteenth Census of the United States: JQ40, Agriculture. United States Summary, First Swies, Table vI;
Supplemental for the Southern States.
The rise in ownership and decline in tenancy did not balance each other,
however. The increase in number of owners occurred altogether between
1930 and 1935 and was restricted to the white group. The decrease in the
total number of tenants occurred between 1935 and 1940 and was then
divided between the two racial groups. Before 1935, however, white cash
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