REPORT OF THE CENSUS BOARD.

CENSUS OFFICE, November 30, 1850.

SIR: I have the honor to report that this office was organized, immediately after the passage of the act of 23d May last, by the appointment of a Superintendent and the necessary clerks and other assistants. The force employed has varied as the requirements of its duties seemed to justify. During the month of August, there were employed, in addition to the Superintendent, twenty-one persons, at salaries varying from three hundred and fifty to one thousand dollars.

In September, the services of but fourteen persons were required. For the entire month of November, thirty-four persons have been constantly engaged in various duties.

The printing for this office has been executed under the direction of the Census Board, in accordance with the 19th section of the act of 23d May last. The schedules have been furnished, and the other printing executed as required, in a satisfactory manner.

The work of taking the census is progressing with great uniformity throughout the whole extent of the United States and Territories. The returns made are in the main very satisfactory, and exhibit a commendable degree of prudence and discrimination by the marshals in the appointment of their assistants. The entire number of assistants will somewhat exceed three thousand, from nine hundred and sixty-seven of whom returns have been received at this office, exhibiting, on comparison with the census of 1840, a gratifying increase in population and wealth in every part of the Union.

The materials furnished by the present census, apart from the geographical information contained and the sanitary condition of each portion of the United States developed, will afford the elements for a compilation of value, illustrative of the industry, enterprise, and social condition of our people, unequalled by anything now existing with reference to any country.

Great as must prove the labor to compile the materials furnished by these returns and condense them into proper form, it is believed that it will prove as nothing in comparison with the value of a work which is calculated to exhibit, not only our onward progress as a nation to wealth and numbers, as compared with the past, but our exact condition, at the middle of the 19th century, with reference to population, internal improvements, agriculture, manufactures, and the mechanic arts-literature, education, religion, and morals. It is believed that the population returns. and all other interests may be comprised within three or four volumes folio-a form at once convenient and suitable.

The compensation provided by the act of May last for marshals and their assistants is found generally to be sufficient, but in a very few cases entirely inadequate, as the actual expense incurred by the officer has exceeded the amount which by law he is authorized to receive.

The proper remedy for such cases would be an extension thereto of the provisions of the first section of the "supplementary act" approved August 30, 1850.

Read, and ordered to be printed, with the accompanying documents.

PART II.

WASHINGTON:

PRINTED FOR THE SENATE.

1850.

SIR: I beg leave to submit the following report of the operations of this department during the last year.

The aggregate strength of the army, as at present established by law, and supposing every company to have its complement, is twelve thousand nine hundred and twenty-seven (12,927) officers and men, including all the staff corps. It rarely happens, however, that a company is complete, for, while on the one hand the enlistments can never exceed the limit prescribed by law, deaths, discharges, and desertions must always cause the number of men actually enrolled and in pay to fall far short of it. This is particularly the case in regard to troops stationed at the frontier posts; for, as the men are all enlisted in the older States, considerable time must always intervene between the happening of a vacancy and its being filled. It is estimated by competent judges that owing to these causes, combined with sickness and other casualties of the service, the number of men actually in service and fit for duty usually falls short of the legal organization, on an average of from thirty to forty per cent.

The report of the Adjutant General, hereto appended, will show how this force is distributed. By that document it will be seen that out of the twelve thousand nine hundred and twenty-seven (12,927) officers and men composing the army, seven thousand seven hundred and ninety-six (7,796,) or more than one-half, are stationed in, or are under orders for, Texas, New Mexico, California and Oregon.

When it is recollected that large accessions have, within a few years past, been made to our territory; that an extensive seaboard will require fortifications, and an enlarged inland frontier needs protection against the Indians, it will appear manifest that the present military establishment of the country is entirely inadequate to its wants. Allow me to call your attention to the remarks, on this subject, contained in the report of the general-in-chief.

The most important duty which at present devolves on the department, is the protection of Texas and New Mexico against the Indian tribes in their vicinity. This object has engaged the anxious attention of the department, and all the means at its disposal have been employed to effect it.

The recruiting service has been actively prosecuted, with a view to bringing the companies stationed on that frontier to their complement of seventy-four (74) men, as fixed by the act of the 17th of June last. Prompt measures have also been taken to carry into effect the provision of the