Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1891-07-10


of the Massachusetts, Institute of Technol-
ogy, man Of well-known eminence and
authority in statistical affairs. at one time
the head of the National bureau of statis-
tics, and the superintendent of the census for
the years 1870 and 1880, contributes to the
July Forum an interesting and instructive
article on the facts and indications shown
by the results of the census of 1890 with re-
gard to the probable future of the coored
race in the United States. The most sig
niiicant conclusion drawn by Gen. Walker
in this article, and one that will surprise
very many not already familiar with the
facts, is that the colored race is a constant
ly decreasing factor in the population of
the country, when compared with the pop
ulation as whole, and that even in states
where il is most at home and circumstances
are most favorable the colored race is
scarcely holding its own in the matter of
national increase.
Gen. Walker first calls attention to the
circumstances which brought the black
race to this country and controlled its dis
tribution here But for the slave trade. he
believes that the number of Africans in the
United States would not now exceed 10 600
instead of being about 7,5O0. 900, and since
the end of the slave trade in 1908 there
have been very few accessions from immi-
grafton. Substantially all the coored per
sons in the United States today are de-
scendants of the 1OO,O 900 negro women who
were here in 1910. 1t is to he remembered
that all are rated as ''colored' who have an
admiXture of one-eighth or more of negro
blood. As the slave trade brought the
negro element into our population. so the
institution of slavery largely determined its
distribution. Wherever the master went
within the slave territory, led by his own
personal pleasure or pecuniary profit, there
he carried the class regardless of whether
the natural conditions were favorable to
him or adverse. The former represented
race bred in Northern latitudes. but who
could, if circumstances invited. move south
ward without great danger or inconyen-
ience. The latter, on the other hand,
represented race bred under tropical con
side or 20 northward only at a large sacri-
fee of vitality and force
The first census. in 1890, showed that the
colored population of the country mum
bered 751.2oS. or 1913 per cent of the
whole. In lSl0. soon after the abolition of
the slave trade, it was 1877, sos. or ~ per
cent of the total population. Since then
the ratio of the increase of the colored
element has been less than that of the
whole population and constantly diminish
ing. As We have seen. in 1910 il was 10
per cent of the whole; in 1850 it was less
than 16 per cent: in 1860 slightly more
than IA per cent: in 1850 a little over IL.
and in 1890 ii was a little less than II.
While the ratio to the total population has
thus diminished, the rate of increase among
the negroes themselves has also fallen off.
and is materially less than that for the
white race. In the decade from 1910 to
1s2O it was $3.50 per cent; in that from
1870 to 1850, making an estimated allow |
ance for the imperfections of the census of |
1870, it was 22.07 per cent, and in the last
decade it was only 1919 per cent. as com
pared to 24.S6 for the entire population of |
the country.
Gen. Walker also shows from the census /
statistics that since the abolition of slavery |
there has been a constant tendency in the |
distribution of the colored population to |
correct the displacement of the race due to
the enforced location of the slave element |
by its owners. Its natural habitat is not |
only tropical cline, but low lands in pref |
erence TO high. Delaware MARYLAND, Vir- |
ginia, including West Virginia, Kentucky, |
North Carolina, Tennessee, and Missouri |
were slave states, but large part of their
area was not specially adapted to negro |
labor and life, and slavery was in that part
more an institution of social dignity and
personal convenience than one of economic
profit The cotton states, on the other
hand, including Alabama, Arkansas. Flor
ida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South
Carolina, and Texas, We're much better
adapted by climate and soil to the comfort
of the negro race and to the proftableness
of its labor Gen. Walker compares the
increase of cOlored population in these two
groups of states during the decade from
1880 to 1890, and shows that in the latter
it is much larger than in the former. TAX
ing the first eight states as a whole, and
with them the District of Col
umbia, the increase was only 81 per cent.
while in the other group of eight states it
was about 10 per cent Moreover in the
same state il can be shown that there is a
distinct tendency to increase in the low
cotton lands and to diminish in the noun
famous districts. In Georgia, for instance,
in 1880, 4S,43 per cent of the colored pop
llation was found upon land less than 500
feet above the sea level, and in 1890 the
ratio had increased to 51.S7 per cent.
The natural field of life and activity for
he colored race is virtually circumscribed
)y climate and industrial conditions, and
zen. Walker considers that race thus
United i'm its range becomes subject to inn
'ortant restrictions upon its capabilities of
sustained increase within that range. His
,elief is that the tendency exhibited in the
acts and figures given will continually
,row in force, and that this element will
,e more and more drained off from the
higher and colder lands into the low, hot
egions bordering the Gulf of Mexico" A
Orrelative fact which does not come within