Evening star., 1919-03-10
POPULATION OF D. c.
NEAR HALF MILLION
An Estimate Based on Police
Census and Car-Rid-
ing Public.
SMALL. NET DECREASE

| To the Editor of The star.
! In reference to the commeuda BILE
| article. "Americanze Washingtoni-
| ans" which is appearing in The Star
! daily, I wish to take issue to the
number of Americans (400.000) you
state in these articles as being in
! the District of Columbia at the pres
ent time.
| The latest official census of the
population of the District of Column
! bia was taken by the metropolitan
police on November /, 1917, and re-
suited in an enumeration of 395,497.
It was impractical to take a munich
pal census in 1918, but the relation
of the number of passengers carried
by the street cars operating in the
District during the month of October.
1917, as compared with the number
carried in the corresponding month of
1918, affords an approximate basis
for an estimate of the increase in
the number of people in the District
during the intervening period
Car Fare Increase Gives Clue.
The number of fares collected in
cash and by tickets on both of the
street railway systems here during
october, 1917, was 1I,573.53S; during
October, 1918, 15,399,910, or an in
crease of 3,S26,372, which is 33 6-100ths
per cent of the number of fares. col
lected during the month first men,
toned.
The population of the District in
October, 1917, viz, 395,4s7, plus
33 6-100ths per cent thereof. or 130,751,
would make 526,24S, which, it is rea-
sonable to deduce, is a fairly ap-
proximate approach to the number
of persons residing in the National
Capital in October of 1918, either
permanently or as connected with
some special war activity. =.
Now Nearer Half Million.
If the approximate population of the
District of Columbia was 52s,24s, at
the time of the signing of the arrnis-
tice, and the net loss up to and in
Guiding the week ending February 22,
1919, was only 4,314 (as given out by
the United States Department of La
bor) of the great army of employees
of the United States government, and
allowing twenty to thirty thousand
for those who came here, but are not
connected with the United States gov
ernment. you will find that the popu-
lation of the District of Columbia to-
day is nearer half million than 400,-
900.
In your previous articles (back
for several years) on the half
and-half plan. and before the United
States entered the war, or even back
to 1918. when the population of Wash
ington was estimated at 375 200 and
1858, 900, respectively. those figures, if
I remember correctly having been
used in your articles as being the
number of citizens in the District of
Columbia, you did not make any de-
ductions below these figures for those
who might be here temporarily, and
at that time there ware, no doubt,
thousands who were on the o-calied
temporary rolls of the United States
government.
Suppose we allow 1894, as being the
number of temporary employees in the
United States government today.
though / understand that there are
very few such employees, as the gov
ernment during the past two months
has placed practically every temporary
employe who cared to stay on the
permanent rolls In order to hold them
here. Allowing also 10000 for those
who were here in October, 1918, who