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The Fence Question in the South. 



But we are able to present official statistics to sustain our views. The 

 following is Census Bulletin No. 262, showing statistics of the number and 

 size of farms in the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, 

 Georgia and South Carolina, according to the census of 1880. 



THE NEW FARM SYSTEM OF THE SOUTH. 



DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, CENSUS OFFICE, 



Washington, D. (7., September 10, 1881. 



The following statistics, exhibiting the number and size of farms in six of the Southern 

 States, are published as a Bulletin: first, for the earlier information of the people of the states 

 concerned; and, second, as indicating the scope of the investigation into this subject in the 

 present census. 



Table I gives the gross number of farms, in each of the states referred to, in 1880, in 

 comparison with the corresponding figures in 1870, 1860, and 1850. 



Table II exhibits the distribution of this gross number of farms among three classes, viz, 

 those cultivated by owners, those cultivated by occupiers who pay fixed money rentals, and 

 those cultivated by occupiers who pay as rent a share of the produce. The information 

 contained in this table has not been gathered at any preceding census. 



Table III exhibits the distribution of the gross number of farms by classes according 

 to acreage. 



The marked feature of these tables is the immense increase in the number of farms in 

 the states treated of, owing to the subdivision of the large plantations of twenty and thirty 

 years ago, except only in the case of Delaware, where no very marked industrial change 

 has occurred recently. In this state the increase of the number of farms only corresponds 

 to the increase of population. 



In Arkansas and Florida the increase in the number of farms is also partly accounted for 

 by the occupation of considerable regions which were practically unsettled in 1870. To 

 no small extent this result is due to immigration into these states. 



FRANCIS A. WALKER, 



Superintendent of Census. 



TABLE I. GROSS NUMBER OF FARMS. 



TABLE II. TENURE. 



