In A Man for All Seasons, Robert Bolt’s award winning play about Sir Thomas More’s opposition to Henry the Eighth’s annulment of his marriage to his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, there occurs this exchange between More and his friend the Duke of Norfolk:
Norfolk: Oh confound all this. I’m not a scholar, I don’t know whether the marriage was lawful or not but dammit, Thomas, look at these names! Why can’t you do as I did and come with us, for fellowship!
More: And when we die, and you are sent to heaven for doing your conscience, and I am sent to hell for not doing mine, will you come with me, for fellowship?
This brings me to Michelle Malkin’s blog post titled My Race is “American”:
Fully one-quarter of the space on this year’s form is taken up with questions of race and ethnicity, which are clearly illegitimate and none of the government’s business (despite the New York Times’ assurances to the contrary on today’s editorial page). So until we succeed in building the needed wall of separation between race and state, I have a proposal. Question 9 on the census form asks “What is Person 1’s race?” (and so on, for other members of the household).
My initial impulse was simply to misidentify my race so as to throw a monkey wrench into the statistics; I had fun doing this on the personal-information form my college required every semester, where I was a Puerto Rican Muslim one semester, and a Samoan Buddhist the next. But lying in this constitutionally mandated process is wrong. Really — don’t do it.
Instead, we should answer Question 9 by checking the last option — “Some other race” — and writing in “American.” It’s a truthful answer but at the same time is a way for ordinary citizens to express their rejection of unconstitutional racial classification schemes. In fact, “American” was the plurality ancestry selection for respondents to the 2000 census in four states and several hundred counties.
Here’s what the U.S. Census Bureau website says about why there are so many “race” questions on the census form:
Why does the Census need to know about race?
Race is key to implementing any number of federal programs and it is critical for the basic research behind numerous policy decisions. States require these data to meet legislative redistricting requirements. Also, they are needed to monitor compliance with the Voting Rights Act by local jurisdictions. Race data are required by federal programs that promote equal employment opportunity and to assess racial disparities in health and environmental risks. The Census Bureau has included a question on race since the first census in 1790.
Ms. Malkin is right that it’s illegal to lie on your census form. But is it morally wrong?
What if you are lying in protest of the government’s race-based policies? Wouldn’t that act be similar in kind to the many heroic acts that comprise America’s long tradition of civil disobedience?
When we oppose on moral or constitutional grounds the gerrymandering of districts to allow more African Americans or Asians or women to be elected to federal office, and, as a result of that opposition, mislead the census taker, are we any less noble than, say, Rosa Parks, who illegally (but by no means immorally) refused to move to the back of the bus?¹
If we trust Thomas More’s prescription for salvation (i.e. the doing of one’s own conscience), isn’t it reasonable to assume that we, like Ms. Parks, who surely avoided damnation by doing her conscience, will avoid damnation only by doing our own?
Footnotes:
¹ I can already hear the outrage that I should have the audacity to compare lying on a census form to the heroism of Rosa Parks. So for those who have reading comprehension problems, let me make it clear that I am only comparing the two acts to the extent that each represents the doing of one’s conscience. I could just as easily have used the example of Martin Sheen letting his body go limp on a San Francisco sewer, but then I would have had the same problem in reverse.
15 responses so far ↓
1 dennis // Mar 9, 2010 at 8:22 pm
Webster says that census is the official counting of people, things. anymore items I find intusive, I’m afraid as an older person, they may come and take me to some gas chamber someday
2 Peter // Mar 9, 2010 at 8:55 pm
Dennis,
I got your back.
3 TG McHoff // Mar 11, 2010 at 3:40 pm
I didn’t know American was a race. I just answer Human Race.
4 Peter // Mar 11, 2010 at 7:05 pm
TG,
That’s my favorite race next to the 440 relay.
5 Kevin // Mar 16, 2010 at 1:45 am
Thanks for the thoughts. Last census I entered “Polyglot (including Latin) caucasoid of African descent” but this time there isn’t enough room. “Human” or “homo sapiens” gets the fundamental ontological status right, whereas “American” communicates obliquely the principles upon which the civil disobedience in not answering in racial terms relies. Your post gets it very right that this is an issue of conscience and a moral question for those of us who do not think of others or ourselves in such terms, but want to comply with the law and see the sense of conducting an “actual enumeration” for reasons of fairness in representation.
6 W. Anthony Marsh // Mar 17, 2010 at 10:40 am
I also wrote to the Director’s blog to object to the cultural bias of their form only allowing full first name, middle initial and full last name.
For example, my original Social Security card listed me as W. Anthony Marsh. When I applied for Retirement the clerk told me that I would have to go to court to change my name from William A. Marsh to W. Anthony Marsh.
Many people of different cultures have names which are too complicated to fit into their little spaces. Hyphenated names, Spanish mother’s family name, etc. Many Sihks in my apartment complex are named Singh, but that is not the surname, that is a title like Mr.
Various foreign derivatives use heritage identifiers such as von. But you don’t walk up to someone and say, “Hello von.”
Their census form is racist, sexist, Fascist, and discriminatory.
7 Mara // Mar 30, 2010 at 12:02 am
Recently, I found the 2010 Census form hanging on my door. As I began filling it out, I came across a dilemma. The U.S. government wants to know if my children are adopted or not and it wants to know what our races are. Being adopted myself, I had to put “Other” and “Don’t Know Adopted” for my race and “Other” and “Don’t Know” for my kids’ races.
Can you imagine not knowing your ethnicity, your race? Now imagine walking into a vital records office and asking the clerk for your original birth certificate only to be told “No, you can’t have it, it’s sealed.”
How about being presented with a “family history form” to fill out at every single doctor’s office visit and having to put “N/A Adopted” where life saving information should be?
Imagine being asked what your nationality is and having to respond with “I don’t know”.
It is time that the archaic practice of sealing and altering birth certificates of adopted persons stops.
Adoption is a 5 billion dollar, unregulated industry that profits from the sale and redistribution of children. It turns children into chattel who are re-labeled and sold as “blank slates”.
Genealogy, a modern-day fascination, cannot be enjoyed by adopted persons with sealed identities. Family trees are exclusive to the non-adopted persons in our society.
If adoption is truly to return to what is best for a child, then the rights of children to their biological identities should NEVER be violated. Every single judge that finalizes an adoption and orders a child’s birth certificate to be sealed should be ashamed of him/herself.
I challenge all readers: Ask the adopted persons that you know if their original birth certificates are sealed.
8 Keith T // Mar 31, 2010 at 11:43 pm
I would like to know why there isn’t a classification for CAUCASIAN AMERICAN??? Why should there be a difference. If you’re AMERICAN then damned well be proud of it and don’t blur it race!
9 Rick // Apr 3, 2010 at 6:46 pm
This is absurd. The race question is nothing new, and, by the way, “American” isn’t a race.
And you clearly used the Rosa Parks example because Rosa Parks was black. You can’t say something and then say you’re not saying it.
10 Peter // Apr 4, 2010 at 10:23 am
Rick,
If American isn’t a race how can African American be a race? Just by adding a continent, huh?
I did use Rosa Parks because she was black. Most of the best examples of civil disobedience in this country have involved black people.
11 trekker // Apr 4, 2010 at 4:48 pm
“Why does the Census need to know about race?” Absolutely nothing. For those who care READ Article I, Section 2 of that pesky document. Count me. That is it. Any other question is unconstitutional and I will not answer.
12 Peter // Apr 5, 2010 at 8:31 pm
trekker,
The government, which is run primarily by left-wing bureacrats, uses that information to reconfigure congressional districts to further diversity.
Not everyone thinks that’s a constititutional use of government resources.
13 Bill Harris // Apr 6, 2010 at 10:34 pm
I simply refuse to answer racial questions as an act of civil disobedience. In 2002-3, Arab-Americans had their “private” and “confidential” census data handed over to Homeland Security. Also, I don’t believe America’s message of equality is best served by providing information to help polarize our society.
No matter -what- your race, it can be used by the government one day for nearly anything.
Bill Harris
14 Dr. Feelgood // Apr 21, 2010 at 2:23 pm
Interestingly, the Census website says, “Responses in the write-in spaces on the race question are converted to the appropriate checkboxes during data processing.” I wonder which is the appropriate checkbox for ‘American.’ Is some Census worker going to decide whether I meant ‘white’ or ‘Japanese’ and by what method? Should I expect a household visit? Is the federal government going to tell me that my race is other than that with which I’ve self-identified?
Inquiring minds want to know.
15 ktmaginn // May 6, 2010 at 3:20 pm
I completed 2 questions on my form: 1) how many folks reside in my home, 2) race = ‘other’ AMERICAN. Come to my home, knock on my door.
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