Political Quotes

“I rise today to reintroduce, along with Senator Kerrey of Nebraska, legislation to establish a commission to study the Federal Statistical System. Statistics are part of our constitutional arrangement, which provides for a decennial census that, among other purposes, is the basis for apportionment of membership in the House of Representatives. I quote from Article I, Section I: * * * enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. But, while the Constitution directed that there be a census, there was, initially, no Census Bureau. The earliest censuses were conducted by U.S. marshals. Later on, statistical bureaus in State governments collected the data, with a Superintendent of the Census overseeing from Washington. It was not until 1902 that a permanent Bureau of the Census was created by the Congress, housed initially in the Interior Department.”