[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 118 (Wednesday, September 9, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H7473]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              2000 CENSUS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Maloney) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. MALONEY of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to clarify 
the status of planning for the 2000 Census.
  Some of my colleagues tried to give the impression that the Census 
Bureau is pursuing an illegal course of action by planning for a 
scientific census that will count all Americans. Nothing could be 
further from the truth.
  There are three issues here: Number one, what have the courts said? 
Secondly, what were the terms of the agreement between the 
administration and Congress passed by the Commerce, Justice, State 
Appropriations bill last November? And thirdly, what is the appropriate 
course of action for the future?
  Last month, the District Court for the District of Columbia issued a 
ruling in the case of the U.S. House of Representatives v. the 
Department of Commerce. That court ruled that the use of sampling in 
the census violates the provisions of Title 13 of the United States 
Code.
  If this were the first ruling on this issue, this might be news, but 
it is not. The fact of the matter is, three district courts have ruled 
on this issue since 1980 and all three have come to the opposite 
conclusion.
  Let me read to my colleagues a few of the other courts' decisions so 
that we can make up our own mind about the guidance from the courts.
  In 1980, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of 
Michigan said, ``The words `actual enumeration' in Article 1, section 
2, clause 3 do not prohibit an accurate statistical adjustment of the 
decennial census to obtain a more accurate count.''
  That court went on to address Title 13 and said, ``There is nothing 
contained in Title 13, United States Code, section 195, as amended, 
which would suggest that the Congress was interested in terminating the 
Census Bureau's practice, manifested in the 1970 census, of adjusting 
the census returns to account for people who were not enumerated. All 
that section 195 does is prohibit the use of figures derived solely by 
statistical techniques.''
  In that same year, the United States District Court for the Eastern 
District of Pennsylvania said, ``The court holds that the Census Act 
permits the Bureau to make statistical adjustments to the headcount in 
determining the population for apportionment.''
  In 1993, these concepts were restated by the District Court for the 
Eastern District of New York, which said, ``It is no longer novel or in 
any sense new law to declare that statistical adjustment of the 
decennial census is both legal and constitutional.''
  Three separate district courts have ruled that the use of modern 
statistical methods to correct the census is both legal and 
constitutional. One district court has said that it is illegal and did 
not address the constitutional issue.
  When agreement was reached last November to pursue the legality and 
constitutionality of the census plans in the courts, all agreed that 
the ultimate answer must come from the Supreme Court. This division 
among the district courts, even though it is 3 to 1, simply reinforces 
the wisdom of that decision.
  If we were to draw a conclusion from the district courts, the smart 
money would be on the side of the Census Bureau. But that is not what 
we agreed to, and it is irresponsible to now chastise the Census Bureau 
for continuing down the path laid out last November.
  Where do we go from here? The answer is obvious. We stay the course. 
That is not what the Republican majority is doing. Instead, they want 
to hold the funding for the second half of the 1999 census hostage 
because they fear that the Supreme Court will rule in favor of the 
Census Bureau.
  The Republican majority's fight against the census has always been an 
issue of political survival, not one of getting the most accurate 
count. We need a scientific census, one that will count all Americans. 
We need to support the professional Census Bureau plan.

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