US Census: Valient logistical effort. Can it work accurately this time?

Ah, the most exciting time of the decade: the US Census!

The census, as we all know of course, is a constitutionally-mandated procedure performed every ten years by the Federal Government designed to apportion money and designate representation in the House of Representatives. Everyone is required to take it.

Batter-up, we're on deck for next year. No argument there.

However, one could make an argument (as a friend of mine recently has) pertaining to who exactly the House of Representatives represents. Does it just represent citizens, or non-citizens as well? With an estimated 12 million+ illegal immigrants in the United States (4 million more than in 2000), these numbers could directly affect the given amount of seats in Congress, especially in those states experiencing a rapid influx of migrants.

My constitutional approach would be that because the census is constitutionally required to document every individual living in the United States - legal or not, the census has every obligation to count those illegal in the United States, and thus use their numbers to apportion seats. Therefore, each representative represents everyone living in their district - legal or not. One could disagree and mention that the rapid influx of illegal immigrants was unforeseeable 250 years ago, which is understandable (thus advocating change). I'd be more inclined though to trust the constitution that has guided through the tumultuous events of our past. Regardless, the census is doing its best to prepare for such documentation, despite the widespread fear amongst immigrants that participating in the census could jeopardize their stay in the U.S.



The new representation in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas is bound to increase, and we'll see the extent of that upswing in the allotted representation following 2010. For those of living in those areas, get ready for the gerrymander. For those of you living in those states with one representative - do not worry, you can't lose seats anyway. For those of you in states bound to lose representation - sorry. But don't worry, the illegal immigrant population may be on the decline. As long as the economy is doing poorly and forcing illegal immigrants to go back home for work, there probably won't be as much change as you think.