Land Tenure in Oregon. 57 fruit raising and the production of vegetables. Stock raising is said, for the most part, to be let by cash tenancy, but some- times on shares. Hay land is generally rented for cash ; hops, generally on shares. The reasons for different kinds of farm- ing favoring different forms of tenancy is said to be due, as might be supposed, to the nature of the crop produced. Grain land is not rented for cash, because the quantity of the crop from year to year is so uncertain, a large crop one year not insuring an equal output the next; and the produce is easily divided at harvest time. In fruit raising, dairying or garden- ing, conditions are different. The quantity of the output is more certain and the produce almost impossible to divide. The hay crop is both reasonably certain and easy of division, and is generally rented for cash because this relieves the owner of the responsibility of looking after the selling of his share and allows the renter to do as he pleases with little restriction, making him more independent and self-supporting. Stock raising favors cash renting because it is not always easy to make an equitable division of the property, yet stock are often rented on shares. It is generally conceded that the cash tenant has more money than the share tenant, but in a few cases this is denied. Share tenancy is said by many to be the form of renting employed because the renter has little or no money to pay cash. Cash tenancy is the method preferred by all the landowners but three or four who have reported, if the kind of farming will permit ; the idea being that the cash tenant is, as a rule, more indus- trious and thrifty, more independent and self-reliant, and the owner is relieved of responsibility. Statistics prove beyond all doubt that tenant farming is in- creasing not only in the United States but in each and every state in the Union. This fact is conceded by most of the landowners in this State, but some deny it, as do many people well acquainted with the figures, by saying that tenants be- come landowners in time, and that tenancy is only a stepping
stone to ownership. This idea is true but not conclusive.----
