TENANCY 59 



and partnerships, operates ranch land and farm land, cotton gins, stores, 

 lumber yards, oil mill, packing-house plant, electric light plant, telephone, 

 water works, and other enterprises. By means of experimentation and cost- 

 cutting systems it has been able to reduce considerably the cost of operating 

 farm land. It is able to command labor on its farms at eighty cents per day. 

 And the laborers board themselves!" 4 



The final report of the Commission on Industrial Relations 

 summed up its findings on the Land Question in these words: 



"It was obviously impossible for the commission to attempt a detailed 

 investigation of Agricultural conditions, but because of the very immediate 

 bearing of the land question on industrial unrest, it was felt necessary to make 

 as thorough an investigation as possible of the phases which seemed to have 

 the most direct bearing on our general problem. The phases selected for dis- 

 cussion were, first, the concentration of land ownership as shown by existing 

 statistics; second, the problem of seasonal and casual agricultural labor; third, 

 the increase and change in the character of farm tenancy; and, fourth, the 

 introduction of industrial methods into agriculture through the development 

 of corporations operating large tracts of land. The findings and recommenda- 

 tions with reference to the concentration of ownership and the problems of 

 seasonal labor are set forth elsewhere. At this point it is desired to present 

 the results of the investigations of tenancy and agricultural corporations. 



"As a result of these investigations the following conclusions are fully 

 justified: 



"1. Tenancy in the Southwestern States is already the prevailing method 

 of cultivation and is increasing at a very rapid rate. In 1880 Texas had 65,468 

 tenants' families, comprising 37.6 per cent of all farms in the State. In 1910 

 tenant farmers had increased to 219,571 and operated 53 per cent of all farms 

 in the State. Reckoning on the same ratio of increase that was maintained 

 between 1900 and 1910 there should be in Texas at the present year (1915) at 

 least 236,000 tenant farmers. A more intensive study of the field, however, 

 shows that in the 82 counties of the State where tenancy is highest the per- 

 centage of tenancy will approximate sixty. 



"For Oklahoma we have not adequate census figures so far back, but at 

 the present time the percentage of farm tenancy in the State is 54.8, and for 

 the 47 counties where the tenancy is highest the percentage of tenancy is 68.13. 



"2. Tenancy, while inferior in every way to farm ownership from a social 

 standpoint, is not necessarily an evil if conducted under a system which pro- 

 tects the tenants and assures cultivation of the soil under proper and economi- 

 cal methods, but where tenancy exists under such conditions as prevail in the 

 Southwest, its increase can be regarded only as a menace to the Nation. 



"3. The prevailing system of tenancy in the Southwest is share tenancy, 

 under which the tenant furnishes his own seed, tools, and teams and pays the 

 landlord one-third of the grain and one-fourth of the cotton. There is, how- 

 ever, a constant tendency to increase the landlord's share through the payment 

 either of cash bonuses or of a higher percentage of the product. Under this 

 system tenants as a class earn only a bare living through the work of themselves 

 and their entire families. Few of the tenants ever succeed in laying by a sur- 

 plus. On the contrary, their experiences are so discouraging that they seldom 

 remain on the same farm for more than a year, and they move from one farm 

 to the next, in the constant hope of being able to better their condition. With- 

 out the labor of the entire family the tenant farmer is helpless. As a result, 

 not only is his wife prematurely broken down, but the children remain 

 uneducated and without the hope of any condition better than that of their 

 parents. The tenants having no interest in the results beyond the crops of a 



4 The Survey, April 17, 1915, pp. 63-64 (New York City). 



