[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 144 (Monday, October 12, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H10646-H10647]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            CENSUS LAWSUITS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Pitts). 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 to discuss the census 
lawsuits that will be argued before the Supreme Court on November 30 of 
1998. Mr. Speaker, you sued the Department of Commerce to prevent it 
from carrying out its plans to use statistical methods in the 2000 
Census. A similar case was filed by private citizens, including the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Barr).
  Members must understand the importance of these cases, as my comments 
will demonstrate. I am confident that the Supreme Court will rule that 
the statutes and the Constitution permit the use of statistical 
methods. We must have the most accurate census possible and the use of 
statistical methods is the only way to ensure accuracy.
  Mr. Speaker, I ran across a very good example of why statistical 
methods are the only real solution to an accurate census. It appeared 
this morning in the New York Times, and it talked about the Welcome 
Wagon. It stated that the Welcome Wagon, this is a program that used to 
welcome new residents to their neighborhoods and also do a little 
marketing for local merchants. The article says that the Welcome Wagon 
is closing its doors. Why? Because people are not home. They cannot 
find people at home to welcome when they move into the neighborhoods, 
so they are no longer going to be doing it. They will be reaching out 
through the mail and other ways.
  Mr. Speaker, that is the problem with the census. Knocking on doors 
to get information, many people are not home in America. That is the 
case in very simple terms.
  Six months ago I came to this well to discuss procedural issues 
raised in the court cases. As many constitutional scholars suggest, the 
Supreme Court could rule on procedural grounds and dismiss the cases or 
remand them back to the District Court. The Supreme Court cannot give 
advisory opinions. The Constitution states that there must be a case in 
controversy in order for it to proceed on the merits.
  Today, however, I want to switch from the procedural issues and focus 
on the merits of these lawsuits. The lawsuits filed by the Speaker and 
by Representative Barr ask the Court to review the Census Act and in 
particular two sections which discuss the use of statistical methods.
  In addition to alleging that the Census Act prohibits the use of 
statistical methods, the Speaker and Representative Barr argue that the 
Constitution prohibits their use.

                              {time}  2000

  Because neither the Census Act nor the Constitution creates such a 
prohibition, the Commerce Department may and should use statistical 
methods in the 2000 census.
  The Census Act does not prohibit the use of statistical methods for 
the purpose of apportionment. Two sections of the Census Act mention 
the use of statistical methods. Section 141 plainly allows for the 
broad use of statistics and section 195 states that statistics may be 
used. Yes, two district courts, the District court for the District of 
Columbia and the District court for the Eastern District of Virginia 
recently ruled otherwise. These are the two cases that the Supreme 
Court will hear on November 30 of this year.
  Both of these courts erred in their rulings. First they ignored the 
plain meaning of each of the words of section 141 and 195. Section 141 
gives the Secretary broad discretion to take the census in such manner 
as he chooses, including the use of sampling. Section 195 limits that 
broad discretion by stating that if he considers it feasible, the 
Secretary must use statistical sampling for nonapportionment purposes. 
However, for apportionment purposes, the Secretary's broad discretion 
remains as afforded by section 141.
  Second, even if the courts determined that the Census Act provisions 
are unclear as to whether the use of statistical sampling is 
permissible, they should have deferred to the Census Bureau's 
reasonable interpretation of these provisions as required by law.
  No one disputes the definition of 141, but the real issue is section 
195.
  Section 195 is clear with regard to the requirement of the Secretary 
to use statistical sampling for non-apportionment purposes if he deems 
it feasible. Obviously, Secretary Daley deems it feasible or we would 
not be where we are today. The question the courts reviewed was what 
Section 195 says with regard to statistical sampling for apportionment 
purposes.
  The Supreme Court has ruled on numerous occasions that if a statute 
is silent or anbiguous with respect to the specific issue, the question 
for the court is whether the agency's intrepretation is a permissible 
construction of the statute. It should not decide whether the 
intrepretation is the same intrepretation that the court would have 
made. Therefore, the District of Columbia Court and the Virginia Courts 
failed to give the Bureau the discretion it deserved.
  Three District Courts, the Eastern District of Michigan, the Eastern 
District of Pennsylvania and the District Court for the Eastern 
District of New York, have ruled correctly that the Census Act allows 
for the use of statistical methods. That is why I am pleased that the 
Supreme Court is reviewing the Speaker and Barr's lawsuits.
  The Constitution does not prohibit the use of statistical methods for 
the purposes of apportionment. Instead, it expressly delegates to 
Congress the authority to conduct the census ``in such Manner as they 
by law shall direct.'' Congress passed such a law which give the 
Secretary of Commerce the authority to take the census. THe Secretary 
of Commerce is doing just that, taking the census. The Secretary has 
chosen to take the census using the most modern technological advances 
available.
  Now Congress no longer likes the law it passed and no longer wants 
the Secretary to have the authority to take the census. Congress has 
the right to change its mind but it must do it by law, not by the 
Appropriations process and not through the court system. Until Congress 
passes such a law, the Secretary has the authority to use statistical 
methods.
  I should note that neither the District of Columbia Court nor the 
Eastern District of Virginia reviewed the constitutional issue. 
However, the Michigan, Pennsylvania and New York Courts did reach the 
constitutional issue and they all found that the use of statistical 
methods is constitutional.
  Mr. Speaker, neither the Census Act nor the Constitution prohibits 
the use of modern technology in the taking of the census. I look 
forward to the Supreme Court explaining this fact to the House of 
Representatives and to the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record the following:

                [From the New York Times, Oct. 12, 1998]

            Welcome Wagon to Make Its Visits Via Post Office

                         (By Constance L. Hays)

       The Welcome Wagon is rolling up the welcome mat.
       Since the 1920's, Welcome Wagon's sales representatives, 
     almost always women, have gone house to house visiting 
     newlyweds and the newly moved-in, bearing greeting baskets 
     laden with coupons, magnets, ballpoint pens and other items 
     sponsored by the local locksmith, the town optometrist and 
     other merchants. But these old-fashioned visits are coming to 
     an end, in a testament to changing life styles or perhaps 
     that traditional corporate desire to cut costs.
       The owner of the Welcome Wagon, the Cendant Corporation, is 
     dismissing most of its 2,200 representatives and will replace 
     them with direct marketing through the mail.
       So rather than a lengthy visit with the possibility of 
     real-time conversation, each of

[[Page H10647]]

     Welcome Wagon's targeted households will get a bound 
     directory delivered to the doorstep, in which businesses will 
     have paid to advertise. The point is to reach more people, 
     Cendant spokesmen say, and these days, people are not at home 
     as much as they used to be, because of busier families and a 
     surge in working mothers.
       Cendant, which also owns Avis car rentals and Howard 
     Johnson hotels, has found itself in financial turmoil this 
     year, but the company says its problems are not related to 
     its decision to change the Welcome Wagon.
       This change, however, appears to have taken many sales 
     representatives by surprise and was met with sorrow by some 
     of them. Although they were paid for their work, certain 
     representatives regarded it as more of a social mission than 
     a marketing one. For decades, Welcome Wagon thrived on that 
     very ambiguity, getting over the threshold thanks to its 
     neighborly demeanor when other marketers might not.
       ``My heart is in these home visits,'' said Dee Strilowich, 
     the company's top-performing salesperson, who has worked for 
     Welcome Wagon in Ridgefield, Conn., and nearby Redding for 
     the last four years. ``I loved giving the welcome and 
     greeting to those new movers, new parents, engaged women.''
       But Cendant insisted that times had changed, which is why 
     it decided last month to end the visits and lay off its 
     representatives. ``It's a different world today,'' said 
     Elliot Bloom, a spokesman for Cendant in Parsippany, N.J. 
     ``In the past, 20 years ago, when you knocked on people's 
     doors, Mom was home. Now she's in the work force.''
       A vice president for Welcome Wagon in New York and two 
     other states agreed. ``We had representatives who were 
     beating their heads against the wall because they had the 
     names of several people to go and visit but could never find 
     them at home,'' said the vice president, Dinah Watson. She 
     said she was offered a severance package, which she will be 
     taking, and added that the 250 representatives she supervised 
     have until the end of this month to decide whether they will 
     stay with the company.
       About 500 people will be retained to work in ad sales for 
     Welcome Wagon, Mr. Bloom said. It is being combined with 
     another Cendant company, called Getting to Know You, that 
     specializes in direct mail.
       ``Whenever you make a change like this, there is some 
     displacement,'' said Christopher R. Jones, another Cendant 
     spokesman. Representatives have until the end of the year 
     to make their visits, and after that, ``we've asked them 
     to stop.''
       Mrs. Strilowich, who was greeted herself by a Welcome Wagon 
     representative when she moved to Ridgefield 28 years ago, 
     said she has about 200 visits scheduled through December and 
     would complete them all. She said most of the representatives 
     she had spoken to were sorry to see their jobs end so 
     suddenly. ``A lot of them are in the same situation I was,'' 
     she said, adding that she is the primary earner in her 
     family. ``They were looking for at least two or three more 
     years.''
       Some Welcome Wagon representatives expressed anger over the 
     loss of their jobs and the end of their visits with families. 
     ``Cendant sacrificed us for the bottom line,'' said Wendy 
     Amundsen, one of the company's top-selling representatives, 
     in Stamford, Conn. ``Sometimes there are just more important 
     things in life than money.''
       Cendant has been struggling this year with other, much 
     larger business problems, including an accounting error that 
     stripped $115 million from its 1997 earnings, the subsequent 
     resignations of a host of senior executives, and a stock 
     price that has plunged from $41.69 in April to $9 on Friday.
       But Mr. Bloom dismissed as ``absolute nonsense'' any 
     suggestion that Cendant's wider problems has led to the 
     switch in strategy for Welcome Wagon. He said the company had 
     peaked in 1968 with 1.5 million visits a year, but that the 
     number had fallen to 580,000 last year. Still, Cendant has 
     thought enough of the company to pay $20 million to acquire 
     it in 1995, back when Cendant was known as CUC International 
     and the number of visits was estimated at 500,000 a year.
       At the time, CUC said it planned to expand the sales force 
     and did so, adding some 800 positions by this year. The 
     company saw Welcome Wagon as a marketing device for a 
     personal credit-history business it already owned. With 
     little overhead beyond the 100-person management staff, a 
     toll-free number and a World Wide Web site, profits were 
     substantial. And sales representatives, who were paid by the 
     amount of business they solicited from area merchants, could 
     earn as much as $70,000 a year. Many received benefits as 
     well.
       Welcome Wagon took its name from 19th century Conestoga 
     covered wagons that would greet frontier settlers as they 
     arrived, bringing food and fresh water from the nearest 
     village. The company was founded in 1928 in Memphis. This 
     summer, to mark its 70th anniversary, the governors of 
     several states, including Wisconsin, declared part of July 
     ``Welcome Wagon Week.''
       ``You will visit households when they're celebrating a 
     move, or an engagement, or the birth of a new child,'' 
     promises the Welcome Wagon Web site, which so far has not 
     been altered to reflect the newly impersonal nature of the 
     operation. ``You will also introduce local businesses to 
     Welcome Wagon's unique, personalized advertising program. 
     What could be more fun.''
       But now the fun is over, ``I thought Welcome Wagon would go 
     on forever,'' Ms. Amundsen said. ``Welcome Wagon is like 
     apple pie, baseball, hot dogs. It's an American institution. 
     I thought I would retire in this job.''

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