[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 30 (Thursday, February 25, 1999)]
[House]
[Pages H811-H812]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            DECENNIAL CENSUS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Miller) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. MILLER of Florida. Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Census Bureau 
announced a new plan to conduct the decennial census in the year 2000. 
It was disappointing. The Census Bureau has flip-flopped and now wants 
to have a two-number census.
  What they want is that, after the Supreme Court ruled last month that 
you have to do a full enumeration as the Constitution clearly states, a 
full enumeration will be conducted and that is the good thing, they 
announced yesterday that they will go out and make every effort they 
can to count everybody in this country on April 1, 2000. But what they 
want to do is, once they get that number and so we will have a Supreme 
Court-accepted number that every city, county, census tract, census 
block in the country will have, they then want to do a manipulation of 
that number. They want to take that actual count and manipulate it and 
get a second number. That second number they want to say, that is going 
to be the official number. It kind of baffles my mind.
  I thought when the Supreme Court ruled, I thought when six Federal 
judges last year ruled that sampling was illegal that we would just 
move on and get the job done. But, no, this administration is playing 
politics with the census, and it is very clear now that they have flip-
flopped to go to a second number. Because for the past 7 years they 
have been focused on one number and have said, ``We can't do two 
numbers. We can't do two numbers.'' Now, yesterday, they say, ``Oh, 
yeah, we want to do two numbers.''
  They argued against two numbers, because it will not be trusted by 
the American people, it will add tremendous confusion and it is the 
lawyers' dream. When every city, county and each census tract in this 
country sees two numbers, they are going to want the number that is 
best for them. If they do not get the best number, they are going to 
file suit. This is going to be tied up in the courts for years to come.
  Every State's efforts to do redistricting, and this involves whether 
it is a city council, a county commission, a State legislature or the 
House of Representatives, if they use these manipulated numbers, that 
second census set of numbers, it is going to be thrown out, I feel 
quite confidently, by the court, but it is going to be tied up in the 
courts.

  Why in the world are we wasting the time, the money and the effort to 
do that? Unless we really like to support trial lawyers to give them 
this area. In fact, at the Supreme Court hearing last November, Justice 
Scalia even raised the question, ``Are we going to be creating a whole 
new area of law called census law?'' I guarantee you we are if we go 
with the two-number census.
  What they are going to do is take that original set of numbers, the 
real count, and then they are going to take another sample, a sample of 
300,000. This was attempted in 1990. It failed in 1990. Now, they want 
to take the failure of 1990 and say we are going to do that in the year 
2000.
  In 1990, when they tried to do it, what they did is did regions of 
the country. That is what they are proposing now again. Instead of 
using 750,000, where they are going to have a sample in each State as 
originally conceived, now they are going to have to group States 
together. So my home State of Florida, it is very likely, and we do not 
know yet, lumped in with Georgia, Mississippi Alabama and South 
Carolina.
  They will get all these States together, and then they will use that

[[Page H812]]

sample to go back and adjust Sarasota, Florida, to adjust Bradenton, 
Florida, my home area, or to adjust Miami. As if Atlanta has a lot in 
common statistically with Miami.
  That is what they are going to be doing. That is one reason it is 
going to get thrown out in the courts, but it is just not going to be 
trusted.
  I have proposed, as chairman of the Subcommittee on Census in 
Congress, ideas to improve the census. We are fully supportive of all 
the resources that the Census Bureau needs to do the best job possible 
next year. In fact, this Republican Congress is giving the Census 
Bureau $200 million more than requested by the administration during 
the past 2 years to get prepared for this census.
  For example, one area that we have already passed out of subcommittee 
and that is something called post-census local review. I think that is 
very important to build trust in our census. It was used in 1990. What 
it basically consists of is, after the Census Bureau conducts the 
census, they will send the numbers to the local cities and counties to 
give them a brief time to review the numbers and check for errors. It 
is kind of an audit. And then if they have questions or problems with 
it, they can let the Census Bureau know and the Census Bureau will go 
back and check those numbers.
  Now, in 1990, Detroit added 45,000 people. Cleveland added people. 
The gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Petri) talked about a whole ward that 
was mistakenly left out of one of his areas in his congressional 
district in Wisconsin. Mistakes are made. The Bureau is not perfect. 
But they are refusing to allow cities and counties the opportunity to 
check the numbers before they become official.
  Every elected official in the country should be supportive of this. 
It is only the Census Bureau that says, ``Oh, it's a pain. It's too 
much trouble. We don't want to deal with trouble.''
  We have got to build trust in this census. What you are doing by not 
allowing post-census local review as was allowed in 1990 is you are 
building up distrust already because you are trying to hide something. 
That is wrong. We need to build up that confidence that we are doing 
the right thing. Why not let the local cities and counties have the 
opportunity to review the numbers? But, no, they are so fixated on this 
second number census that they will not do anything to improve and 
build on the full enumeration.
  Mr. Speaker, we need to go to a full enumeration for all Americans to 
be counted in the year 2000.

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