Why States Matter: The Census, Citizenship, and Your Vote
The U.S. Constitution mandates a complete count of all persons living in the United States every ten years — a process known as the decennial Census.
— House Committee on the Budget, 2019
[Note: This is a long post. The good news is, with the exception of this sentence, it WILL NOT MENTION Covid-19. There, done. Now, back to scheduled programming.]
Welcome to 2020: A leap year! The one-hundredth anniversary of women’s suffrage! The ouster of Donald Trump from office (a girl can dream)! And… the US Census!
If you’re like me, over the years you probably haven’t given the US Census much thought. Every ten years, a form arrives in the mail, asking a few pretty basic, if slightly nosy, questions: Who occupies this house? Owner or renter? Race/origin?
This last criterion is not to be confused with the infamous “citizenship question,” about which more is ranted below. The question of race has appeared on the form since the first US Census in 1790, and, as with so much relating to race in America, has its roots in an abomination: the 1787 US Constitutional Convention’s “Three-Fifths Compromise,” which, for purposes of taxation and legislative representation, counted three-fifths of the country’s slave population as “people.” According to blackpast.org, slaveholding states, which had 47 congressmen by 1793, would have had only 33 if not for this deal with the devil.
According to the federal Office of Management & Budget, the race/origin question remains on the Census in order to ensure adequate resources for certain federal programs (healthcare, civil rights, veterans’ affairs, education), and to ensure compliance with the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act (ironic, given that our Supreme Court eviscerated a key part of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, and that “civil rights” for everyone except white Norwegians are eroding). Just a reminder that all data, especially racial data, can be weaponized. Whether statistics are used for good or for evil depends on whom we elect to use them.
Imperfect though it may be, when the Census works as it should — which is to say, when “all persons” are counted and all respondents answer honestly, without fear of intimidation or reprisal — the data gleaned are critical to the nation’s health.
1. Represent!
For one, Census data determine the number of House Representatives each state may send to Congress. Every state is guaranteed one Representative, but since the number of House seats is fixed at 435, the US Census Bureau uses a process called “the method of equal proportions,” aka “reapportionment,” to allot the remaining 385 seats among the 50 states, based on the decennial population count. It’s a zero-sum game: if one state gains a Rep, another state has to lose.
Reapportionment takes place every 10 years, as required by the Constitution, after each Census. Once the Census Bureau crunches the data, it delivers apportionment counts to the President by the end of the Census year; the President then reports to the Clerk of the US House of Representatives the apportionment population counts for each state and the number of Representatives to which each state is entitled. Given our current president’s alternative reality, let’s hope an independent auditor checks/re-checks/triple-checks the numbers.
The Census count therefore also determines each state’s number of Electoral College votes, since a state’s number of Electors equals the total number of the state’s Congressional delegates (Senators plus Representatives).
Census data also determines each state’s number of state legislators, i.e. Representatives and Senators elected to serve in the state, not federal, legislature. Massachusetts, for example, has 160 House districts comprising about 40,000 people apiece, with each district represented by a state Representative, and 40 Senate districts comprising about 159,000 people apiece, each district represented by a state Senator. States draw their own maps to determine the placement of district lines (more on this below).
Because Census data underlie representation, inaccurate Census data result in inaccurate apportionment. Per the House Committee on the Budget: “Apportioning seats affects elections, policy, and representation for a decade, so it is crucial that this process be done fairly and correctly. Therefore, an accurate Census is critical, because even a minor miscount can make a difference.”
2. Map It!
Voters live in areas called “districts,” which per federal law must have nearly equal populations and cannot discriminate on the basis of race or ethnicity.
District boundaries determine who is on our ballot and whom we can vote for, not just at the Congressional level but all the way down-ballot to state legislators and county and municipal officers. Congressional districts determine whom we send to the US Congress; state legislative districts determine whom we elect to our state Congress, or legislature; and municipal districts determine which city officials we elect for various local offices (for purposes of relative simplicity, we’ll leave discussion of municipalities for another article). Bottom line, states use decennial Census data, and in some cases other datasets as well, to draw their federal and/or state district lines.
Let’s start at the federal level. Your current number of Representative(s) is based on 2010 Census data; after the upcoming 2020 Census, your state could potentially gain or lose seats based on whether the Census reflects population shifts in your state over the past ten years.
In 2000, for example, Massachusetts had 10 House Representatives, each representing one of 10 Congressional districts in the state. Over the next decade, the country’s population grew by 9.7 percent… but Massachusetts’ population only grew by an anemic 3.1 percent, according to WBUR. As a result, we lost one of our Congressional districts after the 2010 Census, and are now down to nine House Representatives. Of course, this could change once again given the results of this year’s upcoming Census.
In other words, districts are not static. As the Brennan Center for Justice points out, “Populations change. Some districts gain residents, others lose them. Districts also may change demographically. That’s why district boundaries are redrawn every ten years [as mandated by federal law] to ensure each district has about the same number of people and that districts are reflective and representative of the electorate.”
While federal law is strict about how states redraw their Congressional district lines, state districts are a different story. The US Constitution does not specify parameters for redrawing state legislative district lines, although in theory districts (are supposed to) meet common criteria such as contiguity (areas within a district should be physically adjacent) and compactness (constituents within a district should live as near to one another as practicable). But, like gravity, it’s just a theory. There’s a lot of room for shenanigans on the part of the mapmakers… who, in most states, are our elected state legislators.
(Why partisan legislators rather than an independent commission, you ask? Good question. “We are the only democracy in the world that allows the politicians to draw their own lines and essentially choose their own voters,” notes Ratf — ked author David Daley. Some states, such as Pennsylvania, are moving to shift cartographical control from the legislative body to an independent, nonpartisan commission. Stay tuned.)
The map-drawing process is called “redistricting,” and it’s gotten a lot of press lately due to its evil alter ego, “gerrymandering,” whereby legislators throw contiguity and compactness out the window. Instead, they draw maps that “pack” (concentrate as many opposition supporters into as few districts as possible) and “crack” (dilute the opposition’s votes by spreading members among several districts). Thus manipulated and contorted, the resulting boundary lines maximize the power of their own voters and dissipate that of their opposition.
“He Who Controls Redistricting Can Control Congress.”
Thus spake Karl Rove, and who better to know? Fair legislators ideally use Census data responsibly to draw state maps that ensure accurate-as-possible representation. Unprincipled legislators draw skewed maps in order to entrench disproportionate power and ram through unpopular and damaging policies, a process we’ve seen unfolding over the past decade in GOP-controlled legislatures around the country. See: the GOP’s Redistricting Majority Project, aka REDMAP (“gerrymandering on steroids,” per Daley), whereby GOP legislators have employed extreme gerrymandering to weaken the voting power of people of color, or Democrats, or both.
African-Americans, Democrats, and immigrants tend to live in cities, meaning that legislators who pack and/or crack urban districts can wreak havoc on representative democracy on these populations.
Reminder: we elect the people in charge of drawing our state maps. State elections matter.
3. Money, Money, Money!
The US Census plays a crucial financial role in the country’s health: Census data determine the allocation of up to $900 billion in grants, direct payments, loans, and loan guarantees to states and individuals. From the Tax Policy Center at the Urban Institute & Brookings Institution:
Census-determined funding can mean life or death to millions of Americans. Accurate Census data matters.
About That “Citizenship Question”
The Census is really nothing more than a head-count, albeit one with enormous consequences. So why, in March 2018, did Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross defy recommendations of the US Census Bureau and try to shoehorn the following question into the 2020 Census form: “Is this person a citizen of the US?” If the goal of the Census is simply to tally us up — not just “citizens” or “voters” or “immigrants,” but all of us — why would citizenship matter?
The question, Ross claimed, would help enforce the Voting Rights Act. However. Given the administration’s blatant hostility toward immigrants, most sentient beings realized the question was in fact designed to instill fear in immigrant households and discourage people from filling out the Census form. Contrary to Ross’ assertion, the question would result in less representative government, not more.
Before we delve into his reasoning, some definitions courtesy of Merriam-Webster:
“Citizen: A Native Or Naturalized Person Who Owes Allegiance To A Government And Is Entitled To Protection From It.”
Funny, that last clause could be read two ways, couldn’t it?
We fought as a nation to evolve beyond the Three-Fifths Compromise, and in 1868, we finally hammered out the 14th Amendment to the Constitution: “All [male] persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Two years later, the 15th Amendment was ratified, guaranteeing (male) citizens the right to vote, regardless of “race, color or previous condition of servitude.” Today, any native-born citizen of any gender may legally vote in US federal, state, and local elections upon turning 18. (Whether logistics allow them to vote is another matter; see GOP voter-suppression tactics, below.)
As journalist Jennifer McFayden points out, “voting citizenship” carries some restrictions: prospective voters must demonstrate state residency (usually 30 days), a clean criminal record (although some states, such as Florida, are working to restore post-conviction enfranchisement), and mental competency (citizens declared mentally incompetent by a judge may lose their right to vote).
Plenty of people live in the US who are not citizens, of course (see chart), or who can’t vote. But unlike our founding days, when slaves were literally dehumanized, the non-voters in our country are still considered people, at least for pre-Rossian Census purposes. Children can’t vote, for example, but it’s crucial we count them on the Census so that adequate SNAP and TANF funds can be appropriated. Lawful immigrants may not yet be able to vote, but they need to be counted on the Census; after a certain waiting period, for example, they may receive “qualified” immigration status, in which case they’re eligible for Medicaid.
Citizens and non-citizens alike shop at local businesses, use roads and highways, and qualify for at least some social services. With the exception of our president, all of us pay our share of taxes. (Yes, Stephen Miller, this includes undocumented immigrants: according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the nation’s estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants pay nearly $12b annually in state and local taxes.) Regardless of our citizenship status, when it comes to our impact on our community, all of us “count” — and all of us need to be counted.
“The Michelangelo Of The Modern Gerrymander”
And as it turns out, Ross’ simple question is just the tip of a strategically diabolical iceberg. Consider Ross’ relationship with the above-epithetized GOP redistricting strategist Thomas Hofeller. In a 2015 study conducted for the Texas State House of Representatives, Hofeller spun out a hypothetical, as summarized by Common Cause: “what if the rules of redistricting were changed to draw legislative districts based on the number of voting citizens living in them, not the total number of people living in a state?” [emphasis added]
Okay, wow. Essentially, Hofeller is asking, “what if, for the purpose of drawing state maps (and thus ultimately controlling the state legislature), we changed the rules in such a way that certain classes of people would simply disappear from our tallies, not even be counted?”
The switch, he concludes, “would be advantageous to Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites,” and correspondingly “would clearly be a disadvantage for the Democrats.” However, because the change in rules would be such a “radical departure” from standard Census operation procedure, it would be “functionally unworkable” unless a citizenship question were included on the Census — an eventuality that would most likely garner a “high degree of resistance from Democrats and the major minority groups in the nation.”
This document is what used to be known, back when we were still capable of being shocked, as a “smoking gun.”
Coincidentally, around the time of Hofeller’s report, a top US Census official emailed Hofeller asking for his comments on… a citizenship question in the 2020 Census. Communications between Hofeller, Ross, and others in the Trump administration continued for several years around this issue.
So What Would Happen If…
… Ross’ citizenship question appeared on the 2020 Census, and, per Hofeller’s recommendations, the “rules of redistricting were changed to draw legislative districts based on the number of voting citizens living in them, not the total number of people living in a state?”
Presumably, a number of immigrants, even those already naturalized, would be scared off and would refuse to fill out the Census at all (not unlikely even without the question, given the Trump administration’s open barbarism toward non-white immigrants). If enough people didn’t answer, the Census would record falsely low state populations. For states such as California, which has more immigrants than any other state — as of 2017, almost 11 million, or 27 percent of its total population, according to the Public Policy Institute of California — this could lead to a potential loss of House Representative(s) (and a corresponding gain in Representative(s) in other state(s)); a loss of Electoral votes; and decreased federal funding, all outcomes that we know would delight the current administration.
Of those immigrants who did fill out the Census, those still awaiting naturalization would not qualify as Hofeller’s “voting citizens.” States could toss their answers into the “irrelevant” pile, and state legislators could proceed to redistrict based on a significant undercount of who actually lives in each district. “Representative” government? Hardly.
Hofeller died in 2018, at which point GOP lawmakers in North Carolina — a state with its own history of egregious gerrymandering — fought to prevent release of his copious computer files into the public domain. They lost, thanks to Hofeller’s daughter Stephanie, who recently published some of his records online. Stay tuned for more sordid details to emerge.
SCOTUS Steps In
As soon as they got wind of Ross’ 2018 proposal, more than two dozen states filed lawsuits citing research by the Census Bureau itself showing that the question could intimidate non-citizen households into silence and undermine the accuracy of Census data. Two months later, directly contradicting his own email and phone records, Ross lied about his role, claiming the whole citizenship thing had been the Department of Justice’s idea. [Only the best people — Ed.]
To its credit, SCOTUS deemed Ross’ putative Voting-Rights-Act-enforcement excuse “contrived,” and in June 2019 blocked the inclusion of the citizenship question (prompting yet another presidential “executive order” tantrum whereby Trump vowed to delay the Census, federal law be damned). Thankfully, this did not come to pass — with so much on its plate these days, the administration may be distracted — and in a victory for all who still believe in representative democracy, the 2020 Census will not include the citizenship question.
But We’re Not Out Of The Woods Yet/ State Elections Matter
The profound structural change proposed by Hofeller is of a piece with GOP tactics already in use across the country. Nationally, the GOP controls 21 state legislatures, versus Democrats’ 12, and these legislatures have not been shy about employing voter-suppression tactics — gerrymandering, voter purging, poll closures, all aimed at benefiting “Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites” and reducing the number of (generally minority and/or Democratic) voting citizens.
Indeed, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, “voting restrictions have almost exclusively been promoted and supported by Republicans.” As tends to happen with these things, the madness is beginning to subsume its own: as of last month, nine states had cancelled their Republican primaries, ensuring that only Trump was on the ballot. (Republican outrage? Hello? Anyone?) Never mind non-citizens — the GOP is bent on keeping the rest of us from the polls, too. For a party that touts its patriotism, that’s pretty… un-American.
It remains to be seen how these tactics will affect voter turnout this year (and let’s not forget Russian election interfer– oh, never mind). It remains to be seen whether non-citizens and naturalized immigrant citizens will fill out the Census form. In this climate, who could blame them for keeping their pens capped?
It’s that much more important, then, that those of us with secure citizenship fill out our Census forms accurately, then get out and VOTE — not only for president, but for our state officials, whom we will be relying on for redistricting. We have a chance to shape the next decade. Let’s get to the polls and do it.
- Juliet Eastland
