No, the census has never been delayed. Even when it was really hard to conduct. [View all]
Source: Washington Post
No, the census has never been delayed. Even when it was really hard to conduct.
By Gillian Brockell June 27 at 6:23 PM
President Trump tweeted Thursday that he had asked the lawyers if the 2020 Census could be delayed, no matter how long, following the Supreme Courts decision to put on hold the inclusion of a citizenship question.
So, in 220-plus years, has there ever been a delay to the census?
No, historian Margo J. Anderson, author of The American Census: A Social History, said in a phone interview with The Washington Post. And the date is set in statute.
The exact date of the census is determined by Congress. Census Day has varied over time, but since the 1930 count, the official date has been April 1. And while the process has at times been complicated by a tug-of-war between the executive and legislative branches, the count has never been delayed. Not in the lead-up to the Civil War, not during the Great Depression, not for any reason at all.
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Read more:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/06/27/no-census-has-never-been-delayed-even-when-it-was-really-hard-do/
A census worker collects information in Fairbanks, Alaska, in 1940. (Dwight Hammack/U.S. Census Bureau/FDR Presidential Library)