Stories of the first national census: results delayed by a pandemic and the first policy of the State of Sarmiento

Mariano Moreno tried to apply a census in the provinces that made up the viceroyalty. It was 1810. It would have been done but very partially in Buenos Aires. The Assembly of Year XIII insisted on undertaking a population survey, but it was not lucky and it was recently decided by Justo José de Urquiza, but it was not systematized and many places were not relieved.

The history of the Argentine censuses is vast. Partial or limited, there is unanimity among historians: the first officer was made on September 15, 16 and 17, 1869. Its origin lies seven years earlier, after a law passed by Congress on September 27, 1862, which established a general population census. The following month, Bartolomé Mitre assumed the presidency but could not be implemented in the six years of his administration.

When he assumed the presidency, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento took the bull by the horns. He appointed Diego de la Fuente superintendent of the census and they set to work. The country was divided into five zones: north, south, east, west and national territories. From these large divisions, more limited ones emerged to be relieved by 3,045 census takers, defined as “ordinary civilians” and “characterized and responsible agents, easy to understand”, as De la Fuente pointed out. There were also 700 census commissioners, controlled by about fifteen provincial commissioners, who had to collect and examine the forms. As the official wrote, only three officers were reprimanded for not doing their job properly. At first, it was thought to leave the forms in each house, but that idea was quickly discarded.

The census determined that the country had 1,877,490 inhabitants. But there were facts that frightened him: of 413,465 children of school age, only 82,671 did so. There were more than 300,000 children without education. And he was alarmed when he saw that the population density did not reach one inhabitant for every two square kilometers. We barely surpassed Siberia and New Guinea.

In turn, the survey showed a total of 897,780 males and 843,572 females. In addition, they joined the troops that were fighting in Paraguay and the Argentines abroad. Ruling out immigrants, there was a difference in favor of women of 49,351. There was a marked female majority in Corrientes, Santa Fe and Entre Ríos. Foreigners were concentrated in Buenos Aires, Entre Ríos and Santa Fe.

Poverty reached 75 per cent of the population. And there were many long-lived: 234 people who passed 100 years and scored 1,172 Africans.

The largest number of married people were in Jujuy; in total there were 383,119 throughout the country, while 88,902 widowers were counted, with a marked difference in favor of women, a situation that they found logical because of the wars. And 28,319 women replied that they lived in “amancebamiento”.

In addition, 361 individuals were found to be engaged in prostitution, although the caveat was made that this number would have to be multiplied by ten.

Without education

Of the census takers, 360,683 could read and 312,011 could write, although it was estimated that not everyone answered the truth, and that these figures had to be subtracted by 30%. Of the 413,465 children between 6 and 14 years old who were fit to go to school, only 82,671 did so. More than 300,000 did not attend the classroom.

Of the 300,000 citizens eligible to vote, only 50,000 read and write and the rest did not have any instruction. De la Fuente complained that “democracy, well understood, is done only by the educated, those who can call themselves citizens; the ignorant do not understand either of one thing or another; the master spring of the vote, for democratic government, is distorted, and is most often null, appearance or falsification”.

The census also contemplated counting “insane, cretin, stupid” and also the deaf, dumb and blind. It also threw 2,888 people disabled by the civil wars.

There were 458 doctors, who were surpassed by 1047 healers; 439 lawyers and 1442 teachers. Among 140,000 women, the trades of seamstresses, washerwomen, weavers, ironers, cigar makers and kneaders, among others, were distributed. With the arrival of immigrants, a wider range of trades would open up, such as watchmakers, tailors, typographers, saddlers and hairdressers. Buenos Aires was home to the largest number of liberal and scientific professionals.

There were 262,433 houses built, most of them made of wood, cane and straw, and the least of them with roofs and tiles. The average was 692 people per 100 households. Argentina was home to 180 cities, towns, towns and villages, and the density did not reach one inhabitant every two square kilometers.

The census cost 189,794 strong pesos and was published in 1872. Its final conclusions were delayed by the yellow fever epidemic that had hit the country at the beginning of the previous year.

With the numbers in hand, Sarmiento called a cabinet meeting. There I would utter the well-known phrase “Ministers, given the first census data, I am going to proclaim my first state policy for a century: schools, schools, schools”.

What came is also known history: when leaving the government, in 1874, 100,000 boys were formally educated. It also brought the model of normal schools to train teachers - the first was opened in 1869 - and, to the fright of some, it hired American teachers. Of the twenty schools that existed when Juan Manuel de Rosas fell in 1852, at the end of his term that number rose to 1,120.

It was clear that, for Sarmiento, the census was not only useful to find out how many we were, but where we wanted to go.

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