20 
BULLETIN 1269. U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
compared with corresponding data in connection with large holdings 
of scattered tracts of land not operated by plantation methods. 
Here the percentage of wage-operated (improved) land was only 
10.4 per cent in 322 counties, although a larger portion of this land 
was probably worked by the landlord and family than was the case 
on plantations. 
Table 6. — Proportion of wage labor land as compared with cropper and tenant 
land in plantations in 75 selected counties {6,351 plantations), 1910 
Plantation areas 
Acres 
Per cent of improved land 
worked by- 
Wage 
hands 
Croppers 
and 
tenants 
Total 
Texas-Arkansas 
Louisiana 
Mississippi Delta 
Arkansas-Tennessee 
Alabama-Mississippi Black Belt 
Northern Alabama 
Georgia 
North Carolina-South Carolina. 
Sugar cane (Louisiana) l 
Rice (Louisiana and Arkansas) l 
All areas - 
221, 
162, 
748, 
174, 
530, 
224, 
164, 
18. 
3. 009, 
Per cent 
23.7 
48.4 
23.1 
25.2 
30.3 
25.6 
24.2 
25.0 
41.3 
40.8 
27.8 
Per cent 
76.3 
51.6 
76.9 
74.8 
69.7 
74.4 
75.8 
75.0 
58.7 
59.2 
72.2 
Per cent 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
100.0 
1 In connection with wage-operated land in sugar cane and rice plantations, these figures are considered 
extremely conservative. A record of 103 sugar-cane (106,951 acres) and 53 rice plantations (46,232 acres) 
obtained by special agents employed by the Bureau of the Census in 1910 showed 83 and 97 per cent, 
respectively, of these farms operated by wage hands. 
The 5,300 wage-operated plantations (Appendix A), together with 
the 22,002 plantations mentioned, show an aggregate of 11,103.628 
improved acres. In 1909, approximately 39 per cent of the improved 
area was worked by wage labor, and 61 per cent by croppers and 
tenants. A similar result was shown in the study in 1920 of 207 
plantations. The average percentage of cultivated wage-operated 
land in the latter group was 24.6 per cent (Table 7). Thus it is seen 
that slightly more than one-fourth of the improved plantation area 
in 1909 was worked by wage hands. 
Of the improved land operated by croppers and tenants in 93 
selected plantation counties in 1920, 33.3 per cent of the improved 
land was worked by croppers and 66.7 per cent by tenants. In other 
words, according to these data, just half as much land was worked by 
croppers as by tenants. Again, on 161 cotton plantations, 38 per cent 
of the tenant and cropper land was cultivated by croppers, or as 
shown in Table 7, 30.9 per cent of all land was cultivated by croppers. 
In the light of these facts, it would seem that slightly less than half 
of plantation labor throughout the region is tenant, with the re- 
mainder about equally divided between croppers and wage hands. 
The necessary modifications of this general statement, from a regional 
standpoint , follow: 
Except in Louisiana, the percentage of wage and tenant operated 
land in plantations, analyzed by areas, is approximately uniform 
throughout the CottoD Belt, the range being from 23 to 30 per cenl 
for wage labor, or 70 to 77 per cent for croppers and tenants, as shown 
by Table 6. On sugar cane and rice plantations, about 41 per cent 
