James Piereson is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. PAMELA. A question about citizenship status was included in one form or another in every decennial census from 1890 through 1950. The Census Bureau also says on its website that information about the distribution of citizens and noncitizens is of interest to policymakers, researchers, and advocacy groups. On the other hand, the Court also said in that case that legislative districts must be based on population and that “[l]egislators represent people, not trees or acres.” The Court thus conflated the two concepts of citizenship and population, no doubt because those cases were decided at a time when immigration (legal and illegal) was at near its lowest point in the history of the nation. That question could easily arise in response to the 2020 census, particularly if the citizenship question goes forward as planned. "One problem with our constitutional system is that courts cannot always enforce their own rulings; they often need the cooperation of the executive branch," he explained, warning that Trump may be willing to ignore the judicial branch altogether. As people within various states moved from rural to urban and suburban areas, legislatures were understandably reluctant to adjust district lines to accommodate that evolution—because such an adjustment would force many members out of office. Suppose in representing clients who are scheduled to be questioned—perhaps at … Missouri recently approved a constitutional amendment that would accomplish this goal. In some situations, police may use silence itself as incriminating evi… In the likely event that some states move further in this direction, they will certainly face lawsuits challenging those moves, with the Supreme Court being asked eventually to resolve the unanswered questions from the reapportionment cases. The states must rely on actual counts from the decennial census. In any event, the issue is beginning to move in states across the country. 17. Judicial skepticism is reining in pandemic emergency orders. If one uses those estimates and projects them into mid-2018, the size of the unauthorized population would currently stand at 12.5 or 12.6 million. Even when brought in for questioning by the police an American citizen has the right to remain silent and talk to a lawyer first. Would I have become President without Social Media? "If that happens, we'll have entered a dangerous moment," former federal prosecutor Renato Marrioti wrote in an op-ed for Politico. "Should the census be able to ask you any question it wants?" In Evenwel, the Court ruled that the state of Texas could use population as the basis for legislative districts, in part because, as the state maintained, detailed information on citizenship and registered voters was unavailable or too unreliable to be used for legislative districting and the proposed alternatives to population were unworkable. To continue reading login or create an account. The “right to remain silent” is well-known to anyone who watches movies or TV shows about police, but the constitutional rights that the statement represents are not always very well understood.