Count everyone

The Senate has blocked an attempt to skew the next census in favor of states that do not have large immigrant populations.

Sen. David Vitter, R-La., proposed requiring census forms to ask whether people were U.S. citizens when counted next April 1. The expectation was that noncitizens would be excluded in the population numbers used to reapportion House seats.

Sen. Vitter argued that counting everyone, citizen and noncitizen alike in congressional reapportionment, was "contrary to the whole intent of the Constitution and the establishment of Congress as a democratic institution to represent citizens."

Opponents countered that the plan would discourage immigrants from participating in the 2010 Census. The Census Bureau objected to the cost of reprinting more than 600 million forms. But it is also a matter of political power.

By omitting noncitizens, the census would favor states such as Mr. Vitter's Louisiana, which stands to lose one of its seven House seats. If his proposal went through, Sen. Vitter said Louisiana and eight other states would keep or gain congressional representation.

The losers would be states with high immigrant populations. California could lose five seats; New York and Illinois, one each. Instead of three new seats, Texas might gain just one.

There would also be internal shifts within the states that could favor rural areas over urban regions, where immigrants tend to congregate. That would affect the state drawing of state district lines, which could exclude some people from representation.

Among other consequences, the inaccurate count could also deny states and municipalities federal aid distributed according to their population.

The Senate vote protects one class of people from discrimination and assures a more complete count necessary to fairly allocate House seats for the next decade.