WASHINGTON (AP) — The 2000 census cannot be adjusted to make up for an expected undercount of minorities, the Supreme Court said today, ruling for taxpayers who challenged the Clinton administration's plan.
The federal census law bars use of statistical methods intended to make the national population count more nearly accurate, the justices said in a divided ruling that could have a major effect on money and votes nationwide.
When the census law was amended in 1976, ``At no point ... did a single member of Congress suggest that the amendments would so fundamentally change the manner in which the (Census) Bureau could calculate the population for purposes of apportionment," Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote for the court.
O'Connor said ``it tests the limits of reason" to suggest that Congress would have been silent in enacting ``what would arguably be the single most significant change in the method of conducting the decennial census since its inception."
Adjusting the census likely would have helped Democrats because minorities and inner-city residents, who tend to vote Democratic, made up a large share of the estimated 4 million people missed by the 1990 count.
Republicans oppose adjusting the numbers to make up for that undercount because people who tend to vote Republican also are more likely to voluntarily respond to the census.
Joining O'Connor's decision that adjusting the census figures is unlawful were Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Dissenting were Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, who said the federal census law did not bar the government from adjusting the figures.
Census counts have been imperfect since Thomas Jefferson oversaw the first one in 1790. All sides acknowledge that census-takers cannot expect to find every American.
At issue in today's case was whether the government may use modern statistical knowledge to estimate how many people were missed.
The Constitution requires an ``actual enumeration" of the nation's population every 10 years to help divide the 435 members of the House of Representatives among the states. Census figures also are used to draw congressional, state and local voting districts, and to hand out $180 billion in federal funds each year.
Two lower courts ruled the government's proposal unlawful last year, saying a federal census law barred adjustment of census figures used for dividing the House members among the states.
Clinton administration lawyers contended the government has estimated at least part of the population in each census since 1940, but acknowledged the new plan was a significant change.
The House Republicans' lawyers said the Constitution and federal census law allow only a one-by-one head count.
O'Connor said that because the census law barred the use of statistical sampling, the high court was not deciding whether such methods would violate the Constitution's ``actual enumeration" language.
The government's census plans were challenged by taxpayers in six states — Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — who said adjusting the census would cost them federal money and political power.
House Republicans also sued, saying the Constitution and federal census law allow only a one-by-one head count.
The Supreme Court said the taxpayers had legal standing to sue, and today's ruling was based on their case. The Republicans' appeal was dismissed.
The high court had aimed for an early decision in the case to give the government time to plan for the census, scheduled for April 1, 2000.
The census is conducted by mail, and about two-thirds of Americans return their forms. Census workers then begin knocking on doors to find the rest, but that does not always work.
The Clinton administration's plan would use those traditional methods to find 90 percent of Americans, then use a separate survey of 750,000 people across the country as a ``quality check" to decide where people were overcounted or undercounted.
Three years ago, the Supreme Court ruled the Bush administration could decide not to adjust the 1990 census figures even though a disproportionate share of those undercounted were minorities.
Today, the high court said the Clinton administration cannot decide to adjust the figures when it wants to.
The census law ``directly prohibits the use of sampling in the determination of population for purposes of apportionment," O'Connor wrote. ``When Congress amended ... (the law) in 1976, it did not in doing so alter the longstanding prohibition on the use of sampling in matters relating to apportionment."
Because today's ruling only bars the use of adjusted census figures for allocating House members among the states, the government might still be able to use adjusted numbers for drawing election districts and doling out federal aid. However, Congress could refuse to pay for creating a second set of figures for those purposes.
Last week, in his State of the Union address, President Clinton said, ``Since every person in America counts, every American ought to be counted. We need a census that uses most modern scientific methods to do that."
In dissent, Stevens wrote, ``The Census Act ... unambiguously authorizes the Secretary of Commerce to use sampling procedures when taking the decennial census." He also contended the Constitution allowed use of such methods.
Joining the government's appeal were cities including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit and others that said they would lose if the figures were not adjusted.
The cases are Department of Commerce vs. House of Representatives, 98-404, and Clinton vs. Glavin, 98-564.
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