ABSTRACT
Most economic history textbooks merely give the decennial population figures starting with the Census of 1790 with little or no discussion of their implications. Certainly in America free institutions had done much to promote industry, happiness, and population growth. The American population was growing by the postulated geometrical progression; this represented the rate of increase to be expected under conditions of land abundance, until such time as all the good land would have been occupied and only marginal soils would remain. The Malthusian postulate, that the American population doubled every twenty-five years, would have required an average decennial increase of 32 per cent. The first question then is whether the evidence for the colonial period provides support for the assumption of such a rate of growth. The growth rate derived by this calculation includes the natural increase of the slave population. An estimate of the rate of growth of the white population only may be made via a different route.
