Opinion: Utah's distorted head count

The census is much more than a massive bureaucratic effort to obtain the most accurate possible count of the U.S. population. Large amounts of money, power and prestige are apportioned based on the census results, and the maneuvering for advantage can turn ugly.

The Supreme Court recently resolved one of the most contentious fights over the 2000 census, rejecting Utah's efforts to alter the results in ways that would give the state an extra congressional seat at North Carolina's expense. Without comment, the court chose not to hear Utah's claims that the Census Bureau had acted unconstitutionally by failing to count thousands of Utah residents serving as Mormon missionaries overseas. About 5-million Americans were living overseas at the time of the 2000 census, but the census counts only those in active military or government service. Under the House apportionment formula, counting the estimated 11,000 Mormon missionaries from Utah would have given the state a fourth congressional seat, taking away the 13th seat awarded to North Carolina.

Utah officials argued that the census' methods discriminate against people based on the kind of work they do. They also argued that the census policies constitute an unconstitutional intrusion on religion because they might dissuade Mormons from serving as overseas missionaries. However, the census' policies apply equally to hundreds of thousands of students and private employees temporarily living overseas. Census officials say attempting to account for all those people would greatly increase their costs and lead to inaccuracies. Whether or not the current policy is perfectly fair, it doesn't appear to violate any constitutional protections.

At any rate, Utah officials were much less concerned with the Constitution than with their congressional clout. An additional member of Congress would be invaluable to the state, and with the numbers so close, a court challenge probably seemed worth the trouble.

Utah officials' claims of unfair treatment were undercut by another inconvenient fact: Utah and other sparsely populated states already receive disproportionate representation in Washington. Utah, with a population of 2,233,169, is served by two U.S. senators, the same number as North Carolina (population 8,049,313) -- or California (population 33,871,648).

Our country has long been served well by the constitutional balance between the House, whose members are apportioned according to population, and the Senate, where each state has two members regardless of its size. Instead of trying to distort the head count to gain even greater advantage, Utah officials should have quit while they were ahead.

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