The truth can be found in the barrage of government ads flooding the airways to pressure Americans to fill out the form. It s all about money and political power. The ads provide a colossal guilt trip specifically targeting various groups of citizens with the message that failing to fill out the census form is tantamount to treason. Some ads invoke images of Martin Luther King marching for civil rights. Parents are another targeted group.
Patriotism is the most bizarre appeal.
As usual, the Clinton Administration has no problem equating Big Brother intrusion of personal privacy with civic duty. Somehow they miss the message that massive government spending programs, personal data files, and threats of fines and jail for non-compliance aren t exactly what the founding fathers had in mind. In truth, the Constitution specifically calls for a count of the people every ten years. The nation needs to know how many people it has in order to establish voting boundaries to reapportion seats in Congress and for states to redistrict legislative seats and school boards. Now news comes from the federal immigration service that the agency wants illegal immigrants to fill out the form as well.