Citizenship the Census and Obama
Memes claim that the citizenship question was eliminated by President Barack Obama. He didn’t. The citizenship question in 2010 was treated.
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The Trump government’s fight to put in a question about citizenship into the 2020 census was lost in June when the Supreme Court ruled the government had hidden the reason it sought to bring the question. The majority ruled that the government gave a”contrived,” instead of”real,” justification for the query, and consequently barred it from being included in the decennial census.
The problem is still being debated and a mistake has been introduced into this debate on networking. Several distinct memes are circulating online based on the false claim that former President Barack Obama eliminated the citizenship question from the 2010 census.
One variant of the claim is the creator of the young group Turning Point USA, from Charlie Kirk. His tweet was enjoyed over 75,000 times and become a meme on Facebook. Kirk composed: “If Barack Obama was able to eliminate the Citizenship Question in the census in 2010 with no Supreme Court approval Why does President Trump want their approval to place it back ?”
But the citizenship question wasn’t removed by Obama.
Some background is required by explaining the offender developed.
Beginning in the beginning, the Constitution mandates the U.S. population be counted every 10 years so as to ascertain the number of representatives each state needs to have and also to distribute federal funds. The upcoming census is in 2020.
The complexity of the census grew as the population of the country grew. In 1940, the Census Bureau, for its first time, used sampling for a means to get more detailed information about the people without overburdening all residents with too many queries. That year questions were sent by it and used methods to broaden the outcomes. From 1970, the agency was sending out a short-form questionnaire to each U.S. household and a long-form supplement with more detailed questions to some fraction of U.S. families.
In 1997, the agency outlined a strategy to get rid of the long-form questionnaire after 2000 and replace it with the American Community Survey, which could be sent out to a small sample of families each year instead of once every 10 years. In 2005, the agency began with that survey — that U.S. residents are necessary by law to reply, just as they’re needed to answer the census.
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That background is essential where the citizenship questions are asked for understanding.
Here is how it has been handled since 1820 that there was a citizenship question contained:
1820 — The nation’s fourth census requested this query of every household in the U.S.: “Number of foreigners not naturalized.” This census in 1830 comprised a version of that question.
1840 — The citizenship question was not asked this season. It was not contained in 1850 or 1860, either, though those questionnaires did inquire about a person’s”place of birth,” a question which the government would continue to inquire, in some form, through now.
1870 — The first census after the Civil War asked two specific citizenship questions: “Is the man a male citizen of the United States of 21 years or upwards?” And”Is the person a male citizen of the United States of 21 years or upward whose right to vote is denied or abridged on grounds other than rebellion or other crime?'”
1880 — The census didn’t include any citizenship questions.
1890 — The citizenship query returned this season, asking: “Is the individual naturalized?” That question remained in the subsequent four questionnaires, including the phrase” or an alien” at 1910, 1920, and 1930.
1940 — The census included this query: “If foreign-born, is the individual a citizen?” The 1950 census included the identical question.
1960 — This census didn’t include a citizenship question.
1970 — The short-form questionnaire sent to each household didn’t include a citizenship question, but the supplemental long-form questionnaire sent to families requested: “For men born in a foreign country- Is the individual naturalized?” The query was managed by the 1980 census in a way that was similar.
1990 — The short-form questionnaire sent to each household again didn’t ask about citizenship, but the extended form sent to a family requested: “Is this person a citizen of the USA?” The same was true for the 2000 census.
2005 — The first American Community Survey was sent out with this query: “Is this person a citizen of the USA?”
2010 — The decennial census delivered to each U.S. family didn’t include a citizenship question, like all the short-form questionnaires since 1960. The American Community Survey, which had replaced the long-form census, included the exact same citizenship query as it did in 2005 and continues to today.
Obama didn’t eliminate the citizenship question as to the timeline shows.
Plans to replace the questionnaire were during the Clinton administration and the change occurred during the Bush administration. The 2010 census that occurred throughout the Obama government managed the citizenship question the exact same way it was since 1970; there was no citizenship question on the short-form questionnaire sent to each U.S. family, but a citizenship question was asked on the supplemental form sent out to a smaller sample of families.
Facts Check: True
