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Chris Wysocki
Caldwell, NJ
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In the 1780s New Jersey resident John Kean compiled what appears to be the earliest known census document.
Curators at Kean University in New Jersey recently found a population count of the United States from an "actual enumeration" conducted at least four years before the country's first official census in 1790.
The handwritten tally was found among the papers of John Kean, a delegate to the 1787 Constitutional Convention, which met in Philadelphia and gave birth to the Constitution. A central issue delegates tackled was how to configure a new Congress that would more fairly represent the disparate populations of the 13 states.
A heading on Kean's enumeration says it was presented to the Constitutional Convention. The count appears to have been conducted by the states separately between 1781 and 1786, apparently in person.
According to the count, 2.2 million whites and Indians — they were not broken into separate categories — and 567,000 blacks were living in the 13 states. According to Kean's ledger, most of the state censuses were limited to questions about gender, age and race — a format repeated in the 1790 census.
Fascinating, eh? Even back then the census was obsessed with race, but only in the context of white (and Indians) vs blacks, presumably so that the southern states could enforce the odious 3/5 compromise. And of course in this census, "Indians" meant persons of Cherokee or Chocktaw descent, anyone from Delhi or Bangalore was "white". And guess what, they didn't have a box for "Pakistani" either!
Compare the simplicity of the original census with the idiocy we are forced to endure now.
For the past three weeks, Joseph Dowd has walked through sections of this town, knocking on doors and asking residents 10 questions, over and over again.
"Sometimes you have to ask even basic questions," said Dowd, 67. "Like, 'Mary, are you a female?' There could be a cross-gender situation."
The mind reels.
UPDATE 20 May 2010 09:04:
Linked by Larwyn. Thanks!
Posted at 09:43 by Chris Wysocki
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