I received an email this week with the subject line: Census violating our privacy rights?
It included this comment:
Personal questions are asked by the census taker, [but] I answer only “2 persons live here”. That is all. I consider that anything more is invasive…In past years we have had census takers in our face, in our house, persuading us to give all sorts of info which we refused. Everything from how much money to how many bathrooms. As I recall, the constitution grants the census only the head count.
Actually, this is incorrect. Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution includes:
The actual Enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner as they shall by law direct.
So, what is the current US law?
TITLE 13, CHAPTER 5, SUBCHAPTER II, § 141[g] states:
“census of population” means a census of population, housing, and matters relating to population and housing.
Why someone would decline to state how many bathrooms they have is beyond me (unless there’s an armory hidden in a toilet tank, but I think that’s covered in the Second Amendment).
One Comment on “Census Suspicions”
I really wanted to count my toy Poodle as a Frenchman on the census, but was talked out of it by a school teacher/roommate.
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