Early in the 19th century, America was achieving birth-rates never before equaled in history, in terms of children reaching adulthood. The 1800 census revealed a population of 5,308,843, itself a 35 percent increase over ten years. By 1810 it had leaped to 7,239,881, up another 36.4 percent. By 1820 it was 9,638,453, close to doubling in twenty years, and of this nearly 80 percent was a natural increase. As one Congressman put it: “I invite you to go West and visit one of our log cabins, and number its inmates. There you will find a strong, stout youth of eighteen with his Better Half, just commencing the first struggles of independent life. Thirty years from that time, visit them again; and instead of two, you will find in that same family twenty two. That is what I call the American Multiplication Table.

Paul Johnson, History of the American People, pg. 283 The Congressional Glove, 29th Congress, First Session January 10, 1846, 211 quoted in D.W. Meing, The Shaping of America: Continental America, 1800-1867, 222.