The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1910-03-11
WRONG VIEWS Of THE CENSUS
No Harm Can Come to Any Person Who
Answers the Questions of the
Census Enumerat0r

AN ANACUAh6 OhhNhAAA al oNhh W. "
the Department of Commerce and
Labor:
Letters from the census supervisors
to the United States census bureau
show the erroneous apprehension of a
considerable element OF the population
that their answers to the enumerators'
questions in the next census, begin
ming April IS this year, will cause in
creased taxation, legal entanglements,
or injurious consequences to their per
sons and property.
In order to quiet such unfounded
fears, which would unless removed ma
terially affect the accuracy of the cen
sus, the bureau has prepared an official
statement relative to the decennial CEN
sus, its origin, purpose and uses.
This statement should furnish com
plete assurance to those concerned that
information given the enumerators is
held by the census bureau in the strict
est confidence with reference to the
identity OF the informants, as required
by the policy of the bureau and COM
handed by the law OF the United
States.
The bureau earnestly hopes that cler-
gymen, priests, physicians, school
teachers, employers, and other public
spirited citizens, who come in contact
with large numbers of people, will CO.
operate with the bureau by telling per-
sons who are believed to entertain eTo-
neous opinions of the census the real
facts and urging them to give full re-
plies to the enumerators. Teachers are
particularly requested to speak OF the
census to the school children and ask
them to tell their parents about it.
The statement issued by the bureau
explains that the constitution requires
census of the population to be taken
every ten years in order to reapportion
state representation in the national
house of representatives. 1t is the
means also to ascertain the increase in
the population, agriculture, industries,
and resources Of the nation since the
last census.
1t is emphatically declared by the
statement that the information sought
from the people of the United States is
used solely for general statistical pur-
poses. 1t will neither be published
nor used in any other way to disclose
facts regarding any individual or enter
prise. The census, it goes on to say,
is not, never has been, and cannot be
employed to obtain information that
can be used in any way in the assess
ment of property for purposes OF taxa
ton or the collection of taxes, either
national, state or local; or for deporta-
ton proceedings, extradition measures,
army or navy CONSUMPTION, internal rev.
enue investigations, compulsory school
attendance, child-labor law prosecu-
tons, quarantine regulations, or in any
way to affect the life, liberty, or prop
erty of any person.
1t points. out that replies to the
enumerators are and must be held by
the census bureau in strict and abso-
lutte confidence. All the bureau Off
cials, supervisors, supervisors clerks,
enumerators and interpreters, before
entering upon their duties, are obliged
to take solemn oath not to disclose
any information they may obtain, ex-
cept to the census bureau, and viola
ton of the United States law in regard
to this oath means a $1,000 fine or i'm
prisonment for two years, or both.