WASHINGTON The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to consider whether census
takers may estimate the size of one household based on that of its neighbors, an
inexact technique critics say flouts the Constitution's requirement for an
"actual enumeration."
The household estimation method is used as a last resort when census workers
repeatedly fail to find anyone home.
The court will hear an appeal from Utah, which claims that methods used in
the 2000 census robbed the state of one of its congressional seats. The court
also wants both sides to give their views on whether the Supreme Court has
jurisdiction over the case.
If the justices conclude that they do not have jurisdiction, the decision of
a lower court against Utah would stand.
The court is expected to hear the case next fall, and its ruling would not
affect races to fill congressional seats in the November election.
Utah lost a separate census challenge last year, when the high court refused
to hear complaints that the census wrongly excluded Mormon missionaries working
overseas.
In the latest Utah case, a panel of three federal judges voted 2-1 in
November to dismiss the state's lawsuit challenging the household estimation
technique.
The lower court said it is reasonable to assume that households in the same
neighborhood will be of similar size.
In its appeal to the Supreme Court, the state argued that the phrase "actual
enumeration" means the Constitution's framers specifically ruled out guesswork.
"There simply is no plausible understanding of the term," that would permit
the use of estimated numbers in apportioning House seats, lawyers for the state
wrote.
The 435 House seats are redistributed according to state population after
each decennial census.
Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff has said the estimation method
disproportionately benefited North Carolina, which picked up a seat in Congress
after the head count.
"I'm elated Utah will finally have its day in court," Shurtleff said
Tuesday. "I always told everyone we had a case and that the Supreme Court would
hear it."
The state also argued the estimation method is little different from another
statistical tool called "sampling." The Supreme Court split 5-4 to rule in
1999 that sampled census numbers cannot be used to parcel out congressional
seats.
At the time, the Census Bureau and the Democratic Clinton administration said
sampling would help make up for an expected undercount of minorities in the 2000
head count. Democrats generally support the practice while Republicans oppose
it.
In the current case, the Republican Bush administration defended use of the
household estimation technique, and urged the Supreme Court to uphold the lower
court.
In the 2000 census, the estimation accounted for less than half a percent of
the total U.S. population. But that may have been enough to give North Carolina
the extra seat.
In the formula used to determine House seats, Utah finished just 857
residents behind North Carolina, another fast-growing state. The figures gave
North Carolina its 13th seat and left Utah with three.
Utah has fought its loss through several courts, and hoped the Supreme Court
would accept its appeal as part of the current term. That would have meant a
ruling by July, in time to affect the fall elections.
The court apparently did not see the same urgency. Results of the
congressional reapportionment are already set, which may lead the court to
conclude there is nothing to be settled by continuing with the case.
The Supreme Court affirmed another lower court ruling against Utah in
November. In that case, Utah claimed that it was unfair to count federal workers
and military personnel posted overseas while excluding others temporarily living
outside the United States.
North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper intervened in both lawsuits in
defense of the census results.
The case is Utah v. Evans, 01-714.
