rented out in patches to laborers who are too poor and too much in
debt to merchants to have any interest in keeping up the fertility
of the soil, or rather the ability to keep it up, with the natural
consequence of its rapid exhaustion, and a product per acre on
these, the best lands of the state, lower than that which is
realized from the very poorest.

"(2) Where the two races are in nearly equal proportions, or where
the whites are in only a slight excess over the blacks, as is the
case in all sections where the soils are of average fertility,
there is found the system of small farms, worked generally by the
owners, a consequently better cultivation, a more general use of
commercial fertilizers, a correspondingly high product per acre
and a partial maintenance of the fertility of the soils.

"(3) Where the whites are greatly in excess of the blacks (three to
one and above) the soils are almost certain to be far below the
average in fertility, and the product per acre is low from this
cause, notwithstanding the redeeming influences of a comparatively
rational system of cultivation.

"(4) The exceptions to these general rules are nearly always due to
local causes which are not far to seek and which afford generally a
satisfactory explanation of the discrepancies."

If we are to base our reasoning on the table cited we might argue that
land ownership is a bad thing for Negroes, for tenants of both classes
among them produced more than did the owners. The white cash tenants
also produced more than white owners. In explaining this it is said:
"The fact that cash tenants pay a fixed money rental per acre causes
them to rent only such area as they can cultivate thoroughly, while many
owners who are unable to rent their excess acreage to tenants attempt to
cultivate it themselves, thus decreasing the efficiency of cultivation
for the entire farm." This may be true of the whites, but it is a lame
explanation for the blacks. Negro farmers who own more land than they
can cultivate appear to be better known at Washington than they are
locally. The trouble with the entire argument is that it assumes that
the Negro is an independent cultivator of cotton. This is not quite the
case. In all parts of the South the Negro, tenant or owner, usually
receives advances from white factors, and these spend a good part of
their time ridin