64 ECONOMICS OF LAND TENURE IN GEORGIA [64 



distribution of these holdings by counties is interesting, 

 not only because it suggests the influences that operated 

 in their acquisition, but also because it indicates in a 

 rough way the main area within which the negro was to 

 get his largest grip upon the soil during the succeeding 

 thirty years. 



In every county of the state, excepting Fannin, Union 

 and Warren, the negroes had acquired either absolute or 

 tentative titles to at least a few acres of land. The main 

 body of their holdings, however, was south of a line ex- 

 tending from Columbus through Macon to Augusta. 

 Of the sixteen counties containing over 5,000 acres each 

 of negro-owned land, all, except one, were south of this 

 line. Furthermore, as adding emphasis to the same 

 point, it should be said that of the forty-five counties in 

 each of which the negroes owned over 2,500 acres, only 

 thirteen were to the north of the line. Since the coun- 

 ties in the south are larger than elsewhere in the state, 

 it is possible that an absolutely larger acreage per county 

 in the possession of negroes might not indicate a rela- 

 tive ascendency of negro holdings in those counties. 

 But when the negro acreage considered in relation to the 

 total county acreage is compared in the two sections of 

 the state, the fact is established that the negroes owned 

 a considerably larger percentage of the lands south than 

 f those north of the above-mentioned line. 



A map constructed to show this localization of negro 

 holdings reveals two main centres of development : the 

 one, in the southeastern part of the state beginning at 



land, it nevertheless supplies data concerning the acreage of land-hold- 

 ings that come within a reasonable range of accuracy and trustworthi- 

 ness. Since 1874, the comptroller-general has published in his annual 

 reports a statement of the number of acres of land returned for taxation 

 by the negroes in each of the counties of the state. 



