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A HISTORY OF CENSUS RECORDS
[Taken from the INTRODUCTION to John “D” Stemmons, The United States Census Compendium, A Directory Of Census Records, Tax Lists, Poll Lists, Petitions, Directories, Etc. Which Can Be Used As A Census ( Logan, Ut.: The Everton Publishers, 1973.) Some syntax and other errors have been corrected from the original.]
The tradition of enumerating residents surprisingly is almost as old as recorded history itself. Evidence exists that China compiled lists of inhabitants for tax and military purposes more than twenty three hundred years before Christ.1 For similar reasons, ancient Babylonia and Egypt conducted a census of its citizens.
Moses was ordered to count the Israelites about 1500 B.C. and King David, for military purposes caused a census to be taken about 1017 B.C. for which he incurred divine wrath.2 As probably the most famous ancient enumeration, it has been cited by authorities even in relatively modern times to conclude that taking a census was a religious offence, thereby canceling a proposed census in several instances.
Rome conducted an enumeration of citizens every five years, with some gaps for which statistics are available well before 435 B.C. The area included only that of Rome, until citizenship was extended to all of Italy with a similar increase in the area covered by the census. Caesar Augustus finally included the whole Roman Empire in 5 B.C. and it was probably for the purpose of registering in this enumeration that Joseph and Mary journeyed to Bethlehem.
The Roman census was both an enumeration of adult male citizens and a tax list. It recorded the name and the age of every independent citizen and all members of his family, although the latter do not appear in the returns, together with the value of his property both real and personal. In the last category slaves were included, but it is not possible to judge from the census the number of slaves. Resident foreigners were not listed, but their property was. The lists were made up upon the sworn statements of the citizens. Returns for widows and orphans were made by their guardians; for emancipated sons by their fathers or grandfathers. The lists so constructed answered all governmental needs, especially taxation and recruiting. For taxation purposes the proletariat (capite censi) could be ignored.3
A census of all classes of males excluding women and children was supposed to have been taken in Athens about 317 B.C. by Demetrios of Phalerum although no specific information is available to us today.
Ptolemaic Egypt conducted a census of male inhabitants regularly every 14 years for fiscal and military purposes since a citizen became taxable at 14 years of age. This taxation pattern ended because the wars and excessive living of the authorities became such a burden that the ordinary citizens rebelled. A very few papyrus fragments of these lists have survived which detail the name and age of the taxable resident.4
We are fortunate from the standpoint of history to have many of the statistics of these regular censuses taken in Rome and Egypt. Our historical knowledge of their civilization and population growth patterns is more lucid to us than are the ancient cultures for which we do not have regular statistics.
As in many other respects, the thousand year period following Rome’s demise generally, is devoid of population statistics with the exception of the Breviary of Charlemagne (A.D. 808) and the Domesday Book of William the Conqueror (A.D. 1086) in England.5 Some form of tax list was beginning to be compiled in several countries in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. However these returns were merely lists of land and property holders and not census records as such. The feudal system made unnecessary such records for fiscal purposes as all property generally was held by one Lord. In fact, up to this time, a census in the modern sense had not been taken with the possible exception of those conducted by Caesar Augustus. And not utilizing modern methods, the accuracy of the enumerations taken left something to be desired. Since nobody has ever enjoyed paying taxes many felt the incentive to volunteer less than correct information. Even local officials falsified returns that they might keep some of the revenues for themselves. In general, the more recent the enumeration, the more accurate it became. It has been said that the 1970 U.S. census was the most accurate thus far in our nation’s history, but even then officials estimated approximately 5,000,000 people were missed or 2.5 percent out of a population of 200,000,000.
The first population census for which we have the records seems to have been that taken in the city of Nuremburg in 1449. In response to a siege the city fathers ordered a total listing of the residents and an inventory of the food supply. Strasburg evidently conducted a similar enumeration in 1465.6
A remarkable series of censuses were taken in Renaissance Italy which still exists in the various Italian archives.
For no region of the earth have we as old or as complete a series of censuses as we have for Sicily . The first of these Sicilian “descrizioni” was made in 1501. Then followed three others in the sixteenth century, six in the seventeenth, and four in the eighteenth. The movement of the Sicilian population can therefore be followed from the end of the Middle Ages to the beginning of the taking of modern censuses. The “descrizioni” gave for each commune the number of hearths, and the number of inhabitants, specified by sex. The male population was further classified into two age groups, 18 to 50 and over 50. However, all these particulars appear only in certain enumerations, those of 1583, 1615, 1642, 1652, 1713, and 1747. The enumerations were made by officials expressly appointed in the various communes.7
Evidently, the other Italian states compare somewhat with Sicily in the records remaining with the possible exception of Naples and Milan. These censuses have been described as the very first taken in the truly modern sense.
At any rate, the mass of the material, extending over so long a period, and including at so early a time enumerations of whole populations, is sufficient to disprove once for all that Canada , the United States , or some of the American Colonies were the first to take complete censuses of population.8
Wolfe claims that Spain is second only to Italy for available statistical material in [the] sixteenth century.9 Spain did require officials to conduct several enumerations in their colonies in America before 1600 which constitute the first such to be taken in North America.
France instigated a census in Quebec and surrounding areas in 1666 which listed each name in the household, their age, occupation and marital status. Between 1666 and 1754, more than a dozen enumerations were taken in Quebec, Acadia ( Nova Scotia), and Newfoundland plus many in the French colonies in the Mississippi River Region.
Many censuses were conducted in colonial America in response to requests by the British Board of Trade Office; some very few of which have survived.10
CENSUSES TAKEN IN AMERICA BEFORE 1790
STATE |
NUMBER |
STATE |
NUMBER |
CONNECTICUT |
2 |
NEW YORK |
12 |
DELAWARE |
1 |
NORTH CAROLINA |
1 |
GEORGIA |
0 |
PENNSYLVANIA |
2 |
KENTUCKY |
0 |
RHODE ISLAND |
7 |
MARYLAND |
4 |
SOUTH CAROLINA |
0 |
MASSACHUSETTS * |
4 |
TENNESSEE |
1 |
NEW HAMPSHIRE |
4 |
VERMONT ** |
1 |
NEW JERSEY |
5 |
VIRGINIA |
4 |
*including MAINE **taken as part of NEW YORK
As probably the first modern state to require civil vital registration Sweden also kept a list of inhabitants on a parish basis. This list from each parish plus births, deaths and removals were combined in 1749 to form a census for the whole country. This occurred every three years for a period which was later changed to every five years.11
Here in the United States, the authorization for the census in 1790 seems almost to have been a political accident:
The provision for a decennial census grew out of a protracted controversy between the large and the small states. Under the Articles of Confederation then in force each state had one vote and the congress one chamber. In the Constitutional Convention the small states insisted on retaining their equality; the populous and wealthy states demanded a weight in the councils of the nation proportional to their population and wealth. The compromise which was adopted provided for a legislature of two chambers, in one of which, the Senate, the claim of the small states should be granted, while in the other, the House of Representatives, the claim of the large states was allowed. When this agreement was reached, it was a short step to recognize that a periodic readjustment of the number of representatives in the lower House to changes in the population [or] the wealth of the states was desirable in a country where growth was rapid and uneven. It was decided to base representation [on] population, to count the slaves as three fifths of the same number of free persons and to enumerate the population every ten years.12
And thus the tradition was established for a decennial census beginning in 1790. As the first nation to conduct an enumeration on a regularly recurring basis decennially without exception, the United States established a milestone toward the understanding of population and its movement and growth. Other nations followed suit until now few countries fail to conduct a regular census.
Fortunate indeed is the United States to have regular population schedules for the period 1790-1850 when such a great degree of migration and immigration occurred.
The 1850 census seems to have been influenced by the 1846 census of Belgium in that previously the basic census unit was the house wherein only the head of household was named. With the 1850 census, each individual became the basic unit and all people were listed with their age, birthplace, occupation, and how much property they held. Each succeeding census became more detailed until presently.
Almost no other area has been left untouched so much by statisticians, demographers, geographers, anthropologists and historians as has been that of the census archives in the various countries of the world. It is felt that The U.S. Census Compendium may help those interested experts know what is available.