United States Census
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The United States Census is a decennial census mandated by the United States Constitution. The population is enumerated every 10 years and the results are used to allocate Congressional seats ("congressional apportionment"), electoral votes, and government program funding. Some states or local jurisdictions also conduct Local censuses.
The census is performed by the United States Census Bureau. The first census after the American Revolution was taken in 1790; there have been 21 federal censuses since that time. The last national census was held in 2000, and the next census is scheduled for 2010.
Decennial U.S. Census figures are based on actual counts of persons dwelling in U.S. residential structures. They include citizens, non-citizen legal residents, non-citizen long-term visitors, and illegal immigrants. In recent censuses, estimates of uncounted housed, homeless, and migratory persons have been added to the directly reported figures.
For years between the decennial censuses, the Census Bureau issues estimates made using surveys and statistical models.
The practice of including non-citizens in the official census figures is highly controversial as the census is used for the apportionment between the states of seats in the House of Representatives, and derived from that, of electors to the Electoral College. The Census also employs the practice of using hot deck imputation to assign data to housing units where occupation status is unknown. This practice has effects across many types of areas but is seen by some as controversial because it may increase representation for reliably Democratic districts. However, the practice was ruled constitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Utah v. Evans. Groups like the Prison Policy Initiative assert that the census practice of counting prisoners as residents of prisons, not their pre-incarceration addresses, leads to misleading information about racial demographics and population numbers.
History of the U.S. Census
Censuses had been taken prior to the Constitution's ratification; in the early 1600s, a census was taken in Virginia, and people were counted in nearly all of the British colonies that became the United States.
Down through the years, the country's needs and interests became more complex. This meant that there had to be statistics to help people understand what was happening and have a basis for planning. The content of the decennial census changed accordingly. In 1810 the first inquiry on manufactures, quantity and value of products; in 1840 on fisheries were added, and in 1850, the census included inquiries on social issues, such as taxation, churches, pauperism and crime. The censuses also spread geographically, to new States and Territories added to the Union, as well as to other areas under U.S. sovereignty or jurisdiction. There were so many more inquiries of all kinds in the censuses of 1880 and 1890 that almost a full decade was needed to publish all the results.
For the first six censuses (1790-1840) enumerators recorded only the names of the heads of household and did a general demographic accounting of the remaining members of the household. Beginning in 1850, all members of the household were named by the enumerator. The first slave schedules were also done in 1850, with the second (and last) in 1860. Censuses of the late 19th century also included agricultural and industrial schedules to gauge the productivity of the nation's economy. Mortality schedules (taken between 1850 and 1880) captured a snapshot of life-spans and causes of death throughout the country.
The first nine censuses (1790-1870) were not managed by the U.S. Executive Branch, but by the U.S. Judicial Branch. The United States Federal Court districts assigned U.S. marshals, who hired assistant marshals to do the actual census-taking.