Census Miscellany

The decennial census is coming up; forms will be delivered in March 2010. If you do a Google News search for "census," you come across coverage by various newspapers, television stations, and radio stations urging citizens in their areas to fill out and return the census forms for their own benefit. The reason for this is clear; the more people reported to live in a certain area means more federal funding for local infrastructure. Politically, depending on the results of the census, congressional seats may be reapportioned in order to account for population shifts and congressional districts redrawn to reflect these changes. Article I Section 2 of the Constitution calls for a census every ten years and gives Congress the power to carry out the census in "such Manner as they shall by Law direct."

In a push for widespread participation, advertising for the 2010 census was produced in more languages than ever: 28. The budget for the 2010 census was larger than previous census budgets, allowing for high-profile advertising opportunities like the Superbowl. Read more here.

There have also been efforts to include illegal immigrants in the 2010 census. Says this article, "In October, census officials said they would not ask the Department of Homeland Security to suspend immigration raids during the census period, reversing a policy from 2000, when an immigration moratorium was observed. But census officials say there is no change in a longstanding policy that they do not share identity data with the Department of Homeland Security or any other agency." Essentially, and rightly so, everyone should feel that they can safely respond to the census.

Republican Senate candidate Marco Rubio has taken an odd approach to the issue of illegal immigrants and the census. His staunch support of excluding undocumented immigrants from the census could hurt the state in which he is currently seeking office; Florida could stand to gain a Congressional seat by including more of its inhabitants in the census. According to this post at the Huffington Post, "Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution clearly states that representatives should be apportioned according to a count of 'the whole number of persons in each state.' This includes non-voters, non-citizens and yes, undocumented immigrants." Aside from potentially hurting his state (loss of federal funding and a potential Congressional seat), Rubio's "voter's rights" argument for excluding undocumented immigrants is pretty much crushed by the text of the Constitution.

One final bit of census drama here. Basically, there's controversy as to whether prison inmates count as residents of the place where they are in prison (the status quo) or as residents of where they lived prior to imprisonment. Counting prisoners in the former way "inflates the population of the mostly white, rural towns that have the prisons." Prisoners are generally not representative of the population of the communities in which they are held; does this unfairly take away potential federal funding from prisoners' former neighborhoods? Keep in mind that "the places prisoners come from and the places where they are bunked share a lot in common, such as poverty and unemployment. They also share a hunger for the good schools and jobs that political power brings." Do prisoners count as residents of the city in which they physically reside, albeit unwillingly?

Any thoughts on the census in general?