Outrage Over A Question

Democrats are near hysteria over the return of a question to the U.S. Census that was included in various forms from 1820 until 1950 when a major change in wording was made. From my genealogical research I know it was there along with a question about speaking English. But why so much outrage now and so much confusion?

Democrats, in a gotcha moment, like to lecture us that the Constitution did not call for “citizens” to be counted in the census, but rather “persons” in each state.

What they don’t share is the Founding Fathers stated it this way as the persons counted would have mostly been born in the colonies before the United States existed. So there was no need for a question on citizenship until 1820 when it would hold more validity. But that’s not all, the leftist news media has added to the confusion.

NPR, struggling to refute former White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders, stated her comments regarding the census were inaccurate, incomplete and misleading. But so was the NPR analysis. They used the heading “has the citizenship question been a standard question?” Their answer was no. That’s misleading as there was not a “standard” question asked every time. It sometimes changed wording. But that gave the impression the question of citizenship was not always asked. Then they state, “At first it was conducted by marshals, but later forms were sent to U.S. households with census workers helping those that didn’t promptly send in their forms.” Partly accurate but still misleading. Marshals did conduct the first seven enumerations, but in 1880 trained workers were employed and that practice continued until forms were first mailed eighty years later in 1960, but workers continue visiting homes and do so today even though the majority of census data is collected by forms. (SOURCE: Census.gov). NPR gets a grade of D.

NPR then states the citizenship question was on every census until 1950. Again not completely accurate. No citizenship questions in the first three, then in 1950 a delineation was made between being foreign born or naturalized. This meant not answering yes to either meant the one counted was born in the US. Being born in the US confers citizenship the Democrats say, so NPR getS a grade of D- for sneaky. A less clever NBC referred to it as “Trump’s bogus question.” Hardly unbiased news reporting, but nothing new there. Then starting with the 1960 Census a random sample group was asked the citizenship question and that percentage diminished with each census until being dropped in 2010 during the Obama administration.

Given the fact so many census collections have asked the question in one form or another and even the United Nations recommends including it, why is there opposition to the question now? The implication being a sinister figure from the government might show up to intimidate or threaten the poor immigrant or minority. They say it will discourage people from filling out the forms? NPR reports something called the Urban Institute estimates that 4 million who are undocumented (illegals) won’t be counted. Actually the number may be closer to twenty-two million (SOURCE: Yale, MIT Study, M.M. Fazel-Zarandi, Sept, 2018).

Democrats say an undercount, meaning not counting illegals, could cost some areas representation in Congress and federal money. That is true. But if illegals are counted along with citizens, that gives an advantage to sanctuary cities ruled by the left with Congressional representation and more federal spending. The fear of a loss of federal money would reduce funding all the services they are handing out to illegals. So there’s a strong motive to cry foul by the left. Conversely there’s a point rarely discussed-the fear by Democrats that there are many more millions here illegally than has been estimated- recall the Yale, MIT Study. They don’t want that.

Baker vs Carr (1963) was the defining Supreme Court decision in the drawing of US districts for the purpose of representation in Congress. After that ruling many states had to redraw districts which favored rural areas with small populations over urban areas with larger populations. So the concept of “one man, one vote” in the matter of drawing districts became the standard. Democrats welcomed that change since their strength is mostly in urban areas. Now they don’t want to lose the benefit of massive numbers of illegals in cities for obvious reasons-more members of Congress and more electoral votes for Democrats. Meanwhile rural areas of Middle America which tend to vote Republican would be the losers.

So it’s no coincidence for Democrats to favor massive caravans crossing open borders, policies of catch and release, free healthcare for illegals and sanctuary cities while vehemently opposing ICE, legal deportations, and a single question regarding citizenship on the 2020 Census. And it’s no surprise a very biased national news actively supports opposition to the question. 

It should be noted also there is a survey called the American Community Survey sent to 3.5 million homes annually by the Census Bureau since 2005. Its goal was supplement data collected by the once-per-decade longer form and it includes the citizenship question. So why aren’t the Dems screaming about the question on this survey? Could it be because the survey isn’t very valid?

The administration has every right to know how many citizens are in each state. According to a study by Deroy Murdock reported in Investors Business Daily and National Review in August of 2017, there are more than 3.5 million people registered to vote in certain counties in 21 states than there are people living in those counties. Something is wrong here and it’s time to correct it beginning with  placing the citizenship question on the form. 


Ralph Miller