Effort to Not Count Undocumented Immigrants in Census 2010 is Constitutionally and Politically Doomed

Once again, we see immigration and anti-immigrant rhetoric employed for partisan political ends.  Sam Roberts of the N.Y. Times reports that Senator Vitter’s proposal to not include undocumented residents when reapportioning Congress would cost California five seats and New York and Illinois one each, according to an analysis of census data by CUNY-Queens demographers. Texas, which is projected to gain three seats after the 2010 census, would get only one. The proposed change would spare Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan and Pennsylvania the expected loss of one seat each. Indiana, Montana, North Carolina, Oregon and South Carolina would each gain a seat. If every resident — citizens and noncitizens alike — is counted in 2010, as the Census Bureau usually does, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada and Utah would gain one seat each and Texas would get three. Sounds to me like Senator Vitter’s Republican Party might well gain from Vitter’s proposal for Census-undercounting of residents.

This is not the first time that efforts have been made to tinker with the Census with respect to the treatment of undocumented, who under the best of circumstances are difficult to count accurately given that many fear apprehension by immigration authorities.  In Federation for American Immigration Reform v. Klutznick, 486 F. Supp. 564 (D.D.C.), appeal dismissed, 447 U.S. 916 (1980), FAIR unsuccessfully challenged the inclusion of the undocumented in Census 1990.  A big problem for Senator Vitter is that Article I, Sec. 2 of the U.S. Constitution requires a Censuss of “Persons.” not U.S. citizens in the country.

Still, the ruckus over Senator Vitter’s proposal — as well as the general politcal climate on immigration — are likely to make it challenging for the Census to convince undocumented residents that it is safe to be counted in Census 2010. 

KJ