Census thoughts

[Phil Fiord]

As you may have heard Representative Bachman plans to only fill in the census form for what the Constitution requires, enumeration of people in a home.

Ok, I agree on this, but my post goes much deeper.

Another known issue is Acorn, a political group, will be collecting the data and Obama moved the census overseeing to the Executive branch in the White House.

Current US Code
http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/13C7.txt

Sec. 221. Refusal or neglect to answer questions; false answers

-STATUTE-
(a) Whoever, being over eighteen years of age, refuses or
willfully neglects, when requested by the Secretary, or by any
other authorized officer or employee of the Department of Commerce
or bureau or agency thereof acting under the instructions of the
Secretary or authorized officer, to answer, to the best of his
knowledge, any of the questions on any schedule submitted to him in
connection with any census or survey provided for by subchapters I,
II, IV, and V of chapter 5 of this title, applying to himself or to
the family to which he belongs or is related, or to the farm or
farms of which he or his family is the occupant, shall be fined not
more than $100.
(b) Whoever, when answering questions described in subsection (a)
of this section, and under the conditions or circumstances
described in such subsection, willfully gives any answer that is
false, shall be fined not more than $500.
(c) Notwithstanding any other provision of this title, no person
shall be compelled to disclose information relative to his
religious beliefs or to membership in a religious body.

That said, note a couple things in that section. Fines for not answering fully will be no more than $100
Fines for lying are up to $500

Now, a followup comment posted by a reader of this article:
http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009...buse/comments/

Chapter 7 Offenses and Penalties,Subtitle II .221 states: (a) Whoever, being over eighteen years of age, refuses or willfully neglects, ***when requested by the Secretary, or by any other authorized officer or employee of the Department of Commerce or bureau or agency thereof acting under the instructions of the Secretary or authorized officer***, to answer, to the best of his knowledge, any of the questions on any schedule submitted to him in connection with any census or survey provided for by subchapters I, II, IV, and V of chapter 5 of this title, applying to himself or to the family to which he belongs or is related, or to the farm or farms of which he or his family is the occupant, shall be fined not more than $100.... Wouldn't moving the census out of the Department of Commerce and into the White House basically negate this law, as it's no longer an employee, officer, bureau or agency of the Department of Commerce?

Good point i think and this is the only time i saw this thought. If Obama is Executive Branch and thats where Census is now housed, the US Code is invalid and one does not have to answer anything beyond the Constitution and how many people.


The down side is if that code is indeed invalid now, so are penalties for misuses by the census takers, in this case Acorn.

[Aplomb]

Great find, Phil.

It's news to me that somebody can be fined for refusing to answer a question. I wonder if an "I don't know" gets you out of that situation.

[American Patriot]

They are talking about this on TV right now.... ACORN is involved in taking the census

[vector7]

Good find Phil,
Did you get a chance to see this thread?
http://www.transasianaxis.com/vb/showthread.php?t=6044

[Phil Fiord]

Aplomb,

Yes, according to the US Code, fines can be levied on respondents who fail to answer in various ways AND Census workers can be fined as well. The problem that I found is that by moving the admin of the Census from Commerce to direct Admin, the US Code may be invalidated. Good for us who respond as fines would be invalid, but bad for us as is invalid, Acorn can abuse information without repercussion. Side note, many claim to have never answered the full form and I have yet to find anyone who says they have been fined in the past. Annoyed, yes, fined no.

Rick,

The story about Acorn doing the Census is an old news really, but the fury over that is brewing on many levels bringing it back into focus. It all a part of Obama doing so much so fast the total sum of changes are hard to follow all at once.

Vector7,

I had not seen that thread, but had read, seen and heard much fact and debate on the matter of Obama taking the Census to WH. Thanks for linking that though. I didn't see it here before posting.

I did copy my first posts in this thread and altered it in format for email to various conservative talk hosts. I am hoping at least one will consider having their people look into the matter.

What I wonder though, is if this proves to be an invalidation of that code section, will the O-WH try and push through a fast addendum to the code, or ignore it to abuse the Census. As its a perfect scenario for the data to be manipulated without legal repurcussion.