Counting On Illegal Aliens

IBD Editorials ^ | April 13, 2009

[Kaslin]

Who Counts?: The next U.S. census chief wants to count people who aren't there. The acting director wants to count people who shouldn't be here. And Acorn will help do the counting.

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Back when he was the Census Bureau's associate director of statistical design, Robert M. Groves, nominated to be the next director of the bureau, recommended that the 1990 census be statistically adjusted to correct an alleged undercount of minorities in urban areas — areas that tend to vote heavily Democratic.

Commerce Secretary Robert Mosbacher overruled him, saying the use of "statistical sampling," as it's known, was a form of "political tampering." The Supreme Court later ruled in 1999 that statistical sampling couldn't be used to apportion House seats among the states, but didn't rule out using estimates to redraw district lines within a state.

Statistical sampling is a technique akin to polling. You select what you consider a representative sample and extrapolate your findings over the general population.

The problem is that Article 1, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution forbids it. It requires an "actual enumeration" of all Americans every 10 years, not a guess based on statistical sampling. That means counting real, live, breathing people. The Founding Fathers weren't fools. Sampling techniques have changed, but human nature has not.

If the Census Bureau were allowed to use sampling, it would have to develop formulas for its samples. How you structure the formula affects the results. It's possible a party in power might determine the desired result first, then determine the sampling formula needed to achieve it.

[MtnClimber]

Should we count foreign tourists visiting Disney World too? They are physically here, but are not citizens either!

[Orange1998]

Talked to a Census worker today. He said he gets paid 17.75 hour, 40 hour max (w-2) and 55 cents a mile.

[Dilbert San Diego]

I’ve heard that there will be outreach to illegal aliens so that they get counted. Should anyone who is not a US citizen be counted? Anybody know if the law requires that anyone here, legally or not, be counted?

I know that ACORN will inflate the numbers of selected favored groups in the census.

Since the Supreme Court ruled that an actual enumeration has to be used for re-apportionment, will Obama follow the court ruling? I understand statistical sampling for other purposes apparently is allowed, but the key purpose of the census is re-apportionment. Everything else is ancillary to that function.

At best, we may see the actual census used for re-apportionment, but sampling used to allocate gov’t spending.

[Tymesup]

Mayor Bloomberg of NY ran an ad asking everyone to participate in the census. He was careful to add that no questions would be asked about one’s citizenship. He presumably wants NY to get its share of the federal pie, whether it’s legal or not.

[HiJinx]

Ping!

[SwinneySwitch]

Quislings!