Mr. Willis of Ohio
The staff pushes for having the next census use sampling techniques (1) that account for underrepresented groups such as the poor and the homeless. Josh takes Sam, Charlie, CJ, Leo's daughter Mallory, and Bartlet's daughter Zoe out for a drink in Georgetown with disastrous results. Leo tells Bartlet about his divorce. Josh discusses the budget surplus (2) with Donna, who wants some of her money back.
(back to top)
Census taking (last updated September 3, 2001) (back to top)
No one knows the actual population of the United States. It changes every day with new births and deaths, is too mobile, lives in too many different circumstances, and is too busy, too inundated with junk mail, or too concerned with privacy to be counted properly.
That being said, the United States Census Bureau is authorized by Congress to conduct an "actual enumeration" of the population of the United States every ten years in order to get a measure of the country and to apportion congressional representation amongst the States. Most of the political and legal controversy over the 1990 and 2000 censuses focuses on how the Census Bureau handles the problem of the "undercount," the estimated amount of the population that it fails to count by traditional enumeration methods. Specifically, the controversy has focused on the Census Bureau's proposed use of statistical sampling to adjust the results of mailed questionnaires and door-to-door census taking; such sampling is probably constitutional but cannot be used for reapportionment purposes.
The undercount, first measured by demographic analysis based on birth and death records, affects how political power and federal funding are distributed throughout the country. In 1980, the undercount was 2.8 million people, about 1.2 percent of the population; this amount was the lowest since the undercount was first determined for the 1940 census. In 1990, the undercount went up to 4.7 million people, about 1.8 percent of the population. Undercounts generally miss minorities and people who are highly mobile or living in nontraditional environments.
Most concretely, it affects the makeup of the House of Representatives. In 1910, Congress decided to stop the growth in the size of the House, freezing the number of seats to 435. From then on, re-apportionment has been a zero-sum game, with one state's gain being another's loss. Congress responded to this decision in 1940 by removing a prior requirement that all districts be compact, contiguous, and of equal size, which meant that while seats were reapportioned amongst states, they could be drawn to disproportionately favor rural areas or certain populations; this has led to many lawsuits over redistricting.
The Census Bureau has adapted over the decades to improve its methods and reduce the undercount; door-to-door census takers are only one part of the "enumeration" process. In 1970, the Census Bureau sent questionnaires out by mail for the first time, using door-to-door census takers only for those households that did not respond. And in 1990, the Census Bureau undertook a massive outreach program through public-service announcements.
While preparing for the 1990 census, the Census Bureau considered for the first time using statistical sampling - specifically a post-enumeration survey (PES) that would allegedly determine the undercount more accurately - to adjust the results of the enumeration phase. However, the Republican Commerce Department announced in 1987 that it was canceling the PES. This meant that the 1990 census would not incorporate any statistical adjustments or sampling, and that the results of the "enumeration" phase consisting of mail forms and door-to-door counting, would stand as final.
New York, expecting that a census without a PES would hurt the state, then sued the Census Bureau. Faced with the lawsuit, the Commerce Department withdrew its decision to cancel the post-enumeration survey for further consideration, conducted the PES, and then in 1991 decided not to adjust the census results based on the PES (according to the PES, non-blacks were undercounted in 1990 by 1.7 percent, whereas blacks by 4.8 percent and Hispanics by 5.2 percent). New York challenged Commerce Secretary Robert A. Mosbacher's decision as arbitrary and unreasonable, but in 1996 the Supreme Court ultimately upheld Mosbacher's authority to make the decision. This decision did not address constitutional or legislation issues, only the procedural issue of an executive official's authority to make a decision.
The 2000 Census was similarly marked by a new debate over statistical sampling.
In 1997, the Census Bureau (now under a Democratic president) announced that it would use statistical sampling in the 2000 census. The Republican Congress and President Clinton fought over the use of statistical sampling, and finally Congress approved the Census Bureau's plan but allowed for quick review by the United States Supreme Court. In January 1999, the Supreme Court held that a 1975 provision, read in the context of prior bans on statistical sampling, did ban the use of statistical sampling for purposes of reapportionment.
The relevant section of U.S. Code Chapter 13, Section 195 reads as follows: "Except for the determination of population for purposes of apportionment of Representatives in Congress among the several States, the Secretary [of Commerce] shall, if he considers it feasible, authorize the use of the statistical method known as 'sampling' in carrying out the provisions of this title." This, the majority of the court held, meant that the Census Bureau was actually required to use sampling for most census purposes, but that the pre-1975 prohibition on sampling for purposes of reapportionment remained in place and continue to this day.
This time, the Supreme Court based its decision on its interpretation of federal laws, but it still did not address whether the Constitution would allow statistical sampling. Generally, courts have read the "actual enumeration" phrase in the Constitution's Census Clause to refer to the population to be measured, not on any particular method of counting. Thus, statistical sampling is probably constitutional and is actually required for some purposes such as distribution of federal funding; moreover, Congress probably could amend current federal law to allow the use of statistical sampling in subsequent censuses.
How much impact adjustment would have had is unclear. Many of the state and local governments that pressed hardest for adjustment in 1990 later found that such adjustments would not have gone in their favor had they been implemented. It is also very difficult to determine which states would be most likely to gain or lose a seat, since reapportionment is based on entirely new calculations based using "the method of equal proportions," which gives each state one seat and then distributes the remaining 385 seats based on a newly-calculated list of "priority values."
For some of the results of the census, go here.
Sources: Census Bureau, Report to Congress: The Plan for Census 2000 (revised and reissued August 1997), available on-line through the Census Bureau's website available here. Department of Commerce v. United States House of Representatives, No. 98-404 (1999). Margo J. Anderson and Stephen E. Fienberg, Who Counts? The Politics of Census-Taking in Contemporary America (Russel Sage Foundation, 1999). Peter Skerry, Counting on the Census? Race, Group Identity, and the Evasion of Politics (Brookings Institution, 2000). Harvey Choldin, Looking for the Last Percent: The controversy over census undercounts (Rutgers University Press, 1994).
Budget Overview (budget surplus/deficit, outlays, receipts, and debt) (last updated January 30, 2002) (back to top)
The federal budget now involves the receipt and spending of around $2 trillion a year, and is the source of much political battle and controversy. In 1998, the budget was balanced for the first time in 29 years, thus ending a battle over deficit spending but opening a new debate over what to do with the budget surplus. That debate ended as the federal government went again into deficit spending by the end of 2001, in part due to an economic recession, President George W. Bush's tax cut enacted in the summer of 2001, and the war on terrorism.
Historically, the federal government generally avoided large deficits from World War II until the late 1970s and early 1980s, when economic recession was followed by President Ronald Reagan's efforts to increase defense spending while cutting taxes. The annual deficit peaked in the mid-1980s ($311 billion in 1983, in constant 1996 dollars) and again in 1992.
Deficits began to fall during the Clinton administration, in part due to economic growth and to Clinton's economic plans. In 1993, Clinton narrowly enacted a five-year deficit reduction plan (218-216 in the House, and 51-50 in the Senate, with Al Gore casting the tie-breaking vote). In May 1997, just months after a long season of government shutdowns and budget crises, the Clinton administration and Congress agreed to balance the federal budget within five years, and actually did so in August 1997, years ahead of the schedule set in 1993.
Within months, a new debate was forming as to what should be done with the budget surplus, which in 1998 was $66.9 billion in constant 1996 dollars.
President Bill Clinton proposed reserving the entire surplus to bolster the reserve funds for Social Security, thus prolonging that program's stability for several more years. Upon taking office, President George W. Bush proposed a budget that he said would increase spending in areas such as education, preserve Social Security, and provide a large tax cut to return taxpayers' money. This tax cut, which gradually reduced income taxes and eliminated the estate tax, was enacted into law in June 2001. Around this time, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill testified before Congress that "the federal budget surplus is projected to be $5.6 trillion over the next ten years," and that Bush's proposed budget was "fiscally prudent."
By the end of 2001, the federal budget was expected to go once again into deficit spending; the surplus had already been shrinking from $237 billion in FY 2000 to $127 billion in FY 2001. On November 28, 2001, White House Budget Director Mitchell Daniels was the first official to admit the likelihood of budget deficits for FY 2002, and the deficit is widely expected to run into the tens of billions of dollars.
Budget deficits turn into federal debt, on which interest must be paid. As shown below in how the federal government outlays its budget, the federal government's outlays for net interest on the federal debt has grown immensely over the past two decades, more than tripling in current-value dollars since the early 1980s. In 2000, the federal government spent $223.2 billion on net interest payments, nearing the amount paid on national defense ($294.5 billion). Deficit and debt reduction would thus reduce the money now spent on interest payments.
For more on the federal budget, go here.
Source: Data taken from historical tables for the FY 2002 budget (see tables 1.1, 1.2, 1.3), available through the White House's Office of Management and Budget, on-line here. George Hager and Eric Pianin, Balancing Act: Washington's troubled path to a balanced budget (Vintage Books, 1998).
|
|
|
Home / Calendar
The West Wing
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
The Colbert Report
Saturday Night Live
Commander in Chief
Law & Order
*
Issues
Resources
Site FAQ
Search via Google
Ripped from the Headlines?
West Wing: Santos discusses a lawsuit about intelligent design
West Wing: Electoral map as of the 10/9 episode; Santos needs to catch up big-time
SNL: The Miers nomination
South Park: Inspired by Katrina
Boston Legal: End to assault-weapons ban
Daily Show: A 2004 study found that 21 percent of young people regularly get their campaign news from comedy shows like the Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Saturday Night Live. So, some footnotes.
NOTE: All photos are copyright their respective owners.
| |
