NARA Prologue Winter 2002, Vol. 34, No. 4

W. C. Bailey, a census supervisor for the 1930 census in San Jose, California, acknowledged that most of the letters he received in the course of his duties as supervisor were "complaining ones."1 For example, in response to a question from Bailey, one census taker stated that the individual living at one address on Hollywood Avenue in San Jose had been enumerated and continued, "This guy lives in a garage which looks the part. . . . I can hardly apologize for neglecting to peek into all the garage windows in my district for a man instead of a bus."2 However, a few actually had something positive to say about the census. One woman told Bailey, "I have walked blisters on my heels, corns on my toes, and nerves and muscles to exhaustion to secure a 100% census of my district. When I secure a few more names on Monday, who are now out of town, I will have succeeded. AMEN!!!"3 Another enumerator noted: "If the others enjoyed the work half as much as I did, they had a good time. The season, the lovely days out of doors, the work in economics study, the endless number of new things one could see and learn; all these go to show that it was an opportunity for a most interesting study. As for me, I found as much of interest outside the [enumerator's] portfolio as inside."4

The circumstances in which the 1930 census was taken were not propitious. Less than six months before Census Day (April 1, 1930), the stock market crash of October 1929 brought what Alan Greenspan might have called a period of "irrational exuberance" to an abrupt halt. As the effects of the crash worked their way through the American economy, tens of thousands of workers in the financial, manufacturing, construction, and wholesale and retail trade sectors of the economy were thrown out of work.5 To make matters worse, American agriculture had been in a depression since the early 1920s.

As the "Roaring Twenties" gave way to the "Hungry Thirties," census officials also had to deal with the failure of the U.S. House of Representatives to fulfill its constitutional responsibility to reapportion seats among the states based on the results of the 1920 census. The causes of congressional inaction involved sectional conflicts (the largely rural, agrarian south versus the industrial northeast and midwest), racial strife, anti-immigrant sentiment, and the divide between urban and rural communities and ways of life. Following nearly a decade of debate, Congress passed, and President Herbert Hoover signed, legislation authorizing the 1930 census on June 18, 1929. This law also contained language that cleared the way for reapportionment to take place based on the 1930 census.6 While the Census Bureau was not responsible for the foot-dragging, one result was to raise serious questions about the capacity of government to carry out its duties.

Following the 1920 census, the Census Bureau's director, William Mott Steuart, concluded that designating January 1 as Census Day had been a mistake. He pointed out that the weather in January 1920 had been "especially severe," had resulted in many delays, and had required taking "unusual precautions" to assure the completeness of the census.7

Accordingly, one of Steuart's recommendations concerning the next census was to move Census Day from the dead of winter back to the spring.8 However, setting the reference date for the census was, and is, a congressional prerogative. The designation of April 1, 1930, as Census Day had to wait for the passage of the authorizing legislation in 1929.9

In the meantime, Census Bureau officials began planning in earnest. In 1927 Steuart noted: "There has been a constant pressure to postpone this preliminary work, and it is safe to say that at no decennial census have satisfactory preliminary arrangements been made."10

One of the largest tasks was to divide the United States into 120,105 enumeration districts, or areas that could be canvassed by a single census taker. In 1927 the Census Bureau began the arduous job of acquiring or preparing accurate, current maps of every city and county in the country. The agency's plan involved contacting knowledgeable people in each of the nation's approximately 65,000 states, counties, cities, townships, and other political subdivisions to inquire about the availability of maps and possible boundaries for enumeration districts.11 While local residents provided helpful suggestions and valuable information, the Census Bureau's professional staff was responsible for determining, plotting and describing enumeration district boundaries; taking into consideration the terrain, population density, and amount of territory an enumerator could cover in the time allotted; and assuring that no boundaries overlapped or left missing areas.12

The 1920 census schedule was the starting point for determining the information to be collected in 1930. For the first time, the Congress did not prescribe in detail the questions that were to be asked in the census; however, it did specify the broad areas that were to be investigated. The number and the wording of the specific questions were left to the discretion of the Census Bureau's director, with the concurrence of the secretary of commerce. Census officials consulted with the members of the agency's standing advisory committee (composed of representatives of the American Statistical Association and the American Economic Association), and requested advice from a conference of experts on the population census. Most of the questions asked in 1930 were similar to those used a decade earlier. After considering a list of about forty new inquiries, Census Bureau experts decided on six new questions:13 two each on housing topics (value of the home, if owned, or monthly rental, if rented; and the presence or absence of a radio set in the home), demographic issues (age at first marriage [for married people only] and whether actually working14), and veterans' concerns (veterans' status and the campaign in which veterans had fought.)

Each of the added questions was designed for a particular use. The items on veterans' status were added at the request of the Veterans' Bureau, probably to estimate future costs associated with veterans' pensions and related programs. The information on the value of homes owned or monthly rent served as a proxy for income and allowed for the classification of families by economic status or buying power. The growing advertising and marketing industry was sophisticated enough to be able to use this information to design advertising campaigns for a variety of products and services.15 Information on the number and distribution of radios was used by the Federal Radio Commission to allocate radio frequencies around the country and to help improve radio reception. The press release on this topic stressed that "The question has absolutely no connection with possible taxation or any other associated idea."16 Steuart added, "Equally foolish is the idea that the Census Bureau is attempting to assist the sales departments of private radio companies by letting them know which specific families do not own radios."17