LAND TENURE AND PLANTATION ORGANIZATION 
19 
the condition that sufficient feed be produced to sustain the plantation 
and that the general fertility of the land be kept up. These " effi- 
ciency gifts/' in exceptional cases, are known to have amounted 
to more than $1,000 a year. 
PLANTATION LABOR 
The type of organization described is responsible to a large extent, 
although there may be other contributing factors, for the system of 
tenure which prevails in the plantation region. While the terminology 
referring to farm workers resembles that outside of plantation areas, the 
actual working arrangement is distinctive, as will appear hereinafter. 
Plantation labor, for the purpose of this bulletin, is divided into 
three classes — wage hands, croppers, and tenants. The cropper, 
from the standpoint of farm organization, may be properly classed 
with wage labor, in which case there would be only two classes of 
Plantations Compared with Scattered Tracts of Land in Large Holdings 
20 
PER CENT 
40 60 
80 
100 
PLANTATIONS 
IMPROVED 
ALL LAND 
SCATTERED TRACTS 
(in large holdings) 
IMPROVED 
ALL LAND 
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CROPPER AND TENANT LAND 
WAGE- OPERATED LAND 
Fig. 7. — This chart shows for 1909 (1) proportions of improved and total land in plantations operated by- 
croppers and tenants and by wage labor, and (2) proportions of land in scattered tracts of large holdings 
similarly operated. (Plantation census of 325 counties, 1909.) It is evident that a larger proportion 
of land in plantations is operated by wage hands than is the case on smaller farms. 
labor on the plantation — wage hands and tenants. On the other 
hand, from the standpoint of management and supervision, the 
cropper may be logically classed with tenants. To take a middle 
course, and class the cropper somewhere between the wage hand and 
the tenant, would be more consistent with his actual status. 
Difference in function between these classes is not so wide on the 
plantation as is usually considered the case in other parts of the 
country. The plantation operator, like the factory owner, conducts 
the establishment so as to realize profit for the plantation as a whole. 
Whether he employs one or all of these classes of labor to this end is 
determined by individual or local conditions. But though the work- 
ers on the plantation do receive compensation according to some sys- 
tem of renting, they are often regarded and referred to by the planter 
in much the same light as the laborer who receives a money wage. 
Proportions of the classes of labor. — Of 22,002 plantations (9,500,287 
improved acres) in 1909, 28.5 per cent of the land was worked by 
wage hands, and 71.5 per cent by croppers and tenants. (See 
Figure 7 and Table 1, Appendix C.) These facts are forceful when 
