[EL] Politico article and Census counting citizens

[Michael McDonald]

If the constitution requires citizenship population data collection,
someone needs to tell House Republicans who voted to kill the American
Community Survey, which is the source of the data:

http://community.amstat.org/blogs/steve-pierson/2012/05/11/house-votes-to-eliminate-american-community-survey

This proves that the Supreme Court can't mandate citizenship for
districting since the House just showed this data collection is a political
question.

============

Dr. Michael P. McDonald

Associate Professor, University of Florida

On Thu, Jun 4, 2015 at 12:43 PM, Douglas Johnson <djohnson at ndcresearch.com>
wrote:

> The “big data problem” part of Dr. Persily’s article seems incorrect. For
> one thing, the column opens with a factually incorrect statement about the
> current Census: “[T]hat data set counts just two things: the total number
> of people, and the number of people over the age of 18.”  As Dr. Persily no
> doubt knows, the current Census short form also counts the members of
> various ethnic groups [I suspect deleting a reference to that was an
> editor’s error].
>
>
>
> But that’s a secondary issue. The heart of the article’s headline-focused
> argument is near the end:
>
> “The fact that no accurate count of citizens exists should be the end of
> the matter. Unless the justices are prepared to mandate a new kind of
> citizen census — one never contemplated by the Constitution — then they
> should leave it to the states to draw their districts using the most
> accurate data available. “
>
> The Constitution, however, also did not contemplate counting voting age
> population nor ethnicity, and both of those questions have been a part of
> the Census short form for decades. I see no reason why adding a citizenship
> question is more of a constitutional question than adding age and ethnicity
> questions were when they were added.
>
>
>
> As Dr. Persily’s article lays out well, districting rules are (somewhat
> oddly) separated from apportionment rules, and the definition of “one
> person, one vote” is remarkably unspecified by the court.
>
>
>
> But I would rebut the article’s main point by saying such an important
> policy question should not be by whether or not a question is included or
> excluded from the Census short form. The questions on the form have already
> ventured far from the Constitutionally mandated count of “persons,” and
> adding or excluding a citizenship question is a policy decision, not be a
> process nor legal challenge.
>
>
>
> While I have not taken a position either way, I believe that since the
> Court made this decision justiciable, it would be good for the Court to
> answer what it meant when it said ‘one person, one vote,’ either
>
> a)      Each elected official in a given elected body should represent an
> equal number of people?
>
> or
>
> b)      Each eligible voter should have equal voting power over the
> decision of who is elected?
>
>
>
> Think of it this way: if a decision is made to add citizenship to the
> Census form, would proponents of answer (a) still want the decision left to
> the individual jurisdictions?
>
>
>
> -          Doug
>
>
>
> Douglas Johnson, Fellow
>
> Rose Institute of State and Local Government
>
> at Claremont McKenna College
>
> douglas.johnson at cmc.edu
>
> 310-200-2058
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Nate Persily on The Supreme Court’s Big Data Problem in Evenwel
> <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=73106>
>
> Posted on June 3, 2015 7:16 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=73106> by *Rick
> Hasen* <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
>
> Politico
> <http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/the-supreme-courts-big-data-problem-118568.html#.VW8MBlxVhHx>
> :
>
> *Legitimate philosophical arguments can be made in favor of using one set
> of statistics over another — just as one could argue that some concerns in
> redistricting, such as keeping counties or communities intact, should
> override the concern for precise equality. A redistricting plan based on
> equal numbers of people, the system we have now, also ensures that the
> workload and constituent-related burdens of representatives are roughly
> equal. In effect, equal representation may be more important than equal
> voting power itself.*
>
> *But the question that confronts the court as it prepares to hear
> the Evenwel case in the fall is whether the Constitution mandates the use
> of one statistic to the exclusion of all else. The fact that no accurate
> count of citizens exists should be the end of the matter. Unless the
> justices are prepared to mandate a new kind of citizen census — one never
> contemplated by the Constitution — then they should leave it to the states
> to draw their districts using the most accurate data available. The one
> person, one vote rule isn’t broken, and the Supreme Court shouldn’t try to
> fix it.*
>
>
>
>
>
>
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>
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