Milford chronicle., 1925-01-30
CENSUS BUREAU REPORT
OF FARM TENANCY
This Article Is Well Worth Con
sidering By Every Farmer
Who Rents Land.

Some new viewpoints on the farm
tenancy question are presented in a
report on the subject recently issued
by the Census Bureau giving an an
alysis Of statistics gathered in 1920.
One of the most significant of these
is contained in the remark that al
though in the discussion of farm ten
ancy it is usually assumed that the
only alternative is between farm
tenancy and farm ownership, yet as
a matter of fact, the real alterna-
tive is, in very many cases, between
farm tenancy and working on farm
for wages. This is emphasized by the
following statement:
"If the renting of farms were pro-
hibited on and after July 1, 1927, by
an amendment to the Federal Con-
stitution, then large fraction of the
two and one-half million farm ten
ants now in the United States would
become, not farm owners, but farm
labOrers; and very many of them
would remain permanently in that
class. These are the men for whom
the tenure question relates mainly
to the distribution of the wealth pro-
duced in farming rather than to the
control of the land. They are farm
ing now for a share of the products
under the supervision of their land
lords. 1t is the landlords rather than
they who take most of the risk in
volved in the farming enterprise,
while the tenants supply little be-
oidoe +ba IobOr CirooA fbic ic tho
only contribution which these men
are in a position to make they would,
perforce, become wage hands rather
than owners in case there were only
these two alternatives.
The common assumption that a
tenant is unfortunate and the owner
a grasping landlord is considerably
discounted by the statement in the
report that Considering only the
money cost of the possession Of the
land, it is in many cases cheaper to
hire land than to purchase or own
it." This is supported by the figures
which show that the average rental
paid on cash rented farms in the
United States in 1920 represented
less than 31a per cent on the value
of the farms. For various reasons,
however, probably among them the
desire for a permanent home, pride
of ownership, expectation of increase
in value, etc., enterprising farmers
in most parts of the country prefer
to become owners as soon as they
are able to do so. It is apparently
part of the American spirit of indie
pendence.
There has been another common
impression which the Census Bur-
eau's report dispels-that tenants
are usually men who have lost title
to farms they had owned and were
compelled to become tenants. There
are undoubtedly cases of that kind,
but the survey of actual facts leads
the Bureau to assert:
Tenancy is recruited, not directly
from the owner class, to any great
extent, but rather from the class of
farm laborerS, who become tenants
instead of becoming owners, or who
spend longer period in tenancy as
an intermediate stage between the
status Of wage hand and that of
farm owner.
For in all parts of the country,
along with a more or less extensive
class of what might be termed per-
manent tenants, are to be found con-
siderable numbers of tenants who
look forward confidently to the time
when they will become owners.
These are the men for whom tenan-
cy represents one of the stages on
the agricultural ladder-an inter-
mediate stage between working as a
farm hand for wages and the owner
ship of a farm. In the North and
West the tenants for whom tenancy
is thus a stepping stone to owner
ship are especially important and
numerous, while in the South, par
among the cOlored farmers,
permanent tenancy-under which |
the tenant expects always to remain |
a tenants more common.
cit seems probable that Aven in |
the North the class of permanent |
tenants is gradually, though slowly,
This fact, perhaps more
than any other single result of the |
of the census statistics rel
alive to farm tenancy, emphasizes
The necessity for improvement in the
,orm of tenant contracts employed
IN connection with the rented farms
If the United States"