Black and White in Indiana.

• Author: Rogers, Carol O.

Statistics and emotions do not generally coincide, but the innocuous looking documents titled working papers numbers 56 and 76 from the U.S. Census Bureau contain a chilling reminder of the early decades in our national and state history. The plain blue covers and inexpensive binding display lengthy titles generally reflective of research tomes, Historical Census Statistics on Population Totals by Race, 1790 to 1990, and by Hispanic Origin, 1790 to 1990.

The working papers, written and compiled by one of the Census Bureau's talented and knowledgeable statisticians, Campbell Gibson, provide us with two important historical documents. (1,2) These documents comprise a numerical history lesson, documenting the changing structure of race in our states and larger cities since the first census of the United States was conducted, as constitutionally mandated, in 1790.

A Compelling Reminder of American History

In 21st century America, we are far removed from the ways of life of the founding Americans. But one look at a simple table reveals how people living in the United States of America were counted by federal officials. It also serves as an uncomforting reminder of the ways we were then able to define human beings as being free or slave and in later decades, attempting to numerically define how black a person was if their lineage was of mixed races. While Indiana has offered hope to African Americans, some believe that the latest census in 2000 harkened back to those times by including the new option for checking all races that apply, again bringing up the question of how much of a race someone is with a numbing array of 164 racial combinations being possible.

As we can see in Table 1, the black or African American population prior to the Civil War was counted specifically by census takers in three ways. First, it was determined if the persons were black (or negro in the terminology of the times). Then, those persons were determined to be either free or slave. It is important to note here that such questions were not asked of the individuals and this is true even today. Rather, the question was posed to the head of the household. The head of the household told the census taker how many people were part of his household (since generally it was a male to whom the census taker turned for responses) and to indicate what their status was--wife, child, other relation, or slave. In the case of so-termed free blacks, the head of their household was...