Did anyone else receive one of these? According to their web site, US Code Title 13, sections Section 141 and Section 193 your response is required by law.
In reality, those sections outline that The Secretary (who is presumably defined elsewhere) can take surveys as a part of their census process. It is Section 221 that requires you to respond:
Whoever, being over eighteen years of age, refuses or willfully neglects, when requested by the Secretary, or by any other authorized officer or employee of the Department of Commerce or bureau or agency thereof acting under the instructions of the Secretary or authorized officer, to answer, to the best of his knowledge, any of the questions on any schedule submitted to him in connection with any census or survey provided…
That’s just a crock.
Oh, sure, census information is useful and all that. It’s just the principal of it. I guess I’ll have to ask the nice lady who came to my door for some evidence that she is an authorized officer or employee of the Deparment of Commerce, or a bureau or agency thereof acting under the instructions of The Secretary.
Heck, I’d pay the $100 if it weren’t for Title 18, Section 3571 (allegedly Section 3559 as well, but that seems to deal with imprisonment and not monetary fines). With it on the books, the “not greater than $100” fine becomes “not greater than $5000” fine. That really blows.
Comments
718 responses to “American Community Survey”
We also have had the misfortune of being selected “at random” for the ACS. However, last October a car was parked across the street from our house and some guy was sitting in the driver’s seat with a clipboard taking notes. I thought it might have been the property assessor but now I think it was the ACS tracking which houses they wanted to “randomly” select!!
We feel as others do that the more power we give the government, the more they’ll take. What happened to We the people, or Liberty and justice..? We are standing firm on IT’S NONE OF THEIR BUSINESS. We have received 35 phone calls this month, (have not answered phone) and fully expect the doorbell to start ringing soon.
Let’s fight this together!
I got a survey too and found the tone overbearing (says right on the enevelope — response required by law) and way too personal.
If they do want to know how much I make and when I leave for work, why not just ask a range of numbers instead to keep things anonymous (like they claim to keep this survey!)
And why aren’t more people against these kinds of surveys? It didn’t even make headlines anywhere?
Here is a Denver TV interview from March 06.
I recieved a third call this Monday eve and informed the person I would be happy to comply with the basic questions of how many people live in my house.
I then informed the person that “the day I fill out the ACS in its entirety is the day the federal goverment puts a serial number on my arm”.
I have contacted my congressman and the media. I especially feel for the older people in this country who must be terrified when recieving this survey. They are being preyed upon.
I agree with the previous blogger. This same type of survey was carried out by the Nazis years back. I’m ashamed of our elected officials for lettting this Census get so out of control.
We the people!
I received 2 phone calls from pleasant census bureau drones. I heatedly expressed my total noncompliance and one said she got that alot, but she was just a worker – sounds like a Nuremberg trial excuse to me. I’m expecting the personal visits to begin shortly. I shall send off my checks to The Treasury next week gleefully knowing I’m funding my own harassment.
I have been badgered by some lady on the phone to participate in the American Community Survey (Sounds so warm and fuzzzy, don’t it?). She went on that it is a legal mandate to participate and that I could get in trouble for not responding. I went on-line and read Title 13 as well. Specifically, Article I of our Constitution says that an enumeration of the population should be conducted every ten years.
The Census Bureau is charged with carrying out the enumeration in the “manner” as told to by Congress. So far, this says to me that Census is told what to do and the manner in which to do. Although, with the American Community Census, it appears that Census Bureau has unilaterally decided to add on all this social engineering cr*p to support more endlesss transfer programs.
I found a copy of the Survey questions on-line, and the damn thing even wants to know if I can bathe myself and how fertile are the all women between 15 and 50 who live in the household! What’s next?
The Census Bureau wants to know all about your finances: Your income with full details including if your income is from umemployment, social security, Disability, ets. They want to konw what type of work you do, if you’re self-employed & how much you earn, job title & category, the number of hours you work, your loans, debt, your utility bills, your insurance coverages (shouldn’t that remain between you and your broker?), hours you work and where, specific address of your employer and contact info, how long it takes you to get to work and when you leave in the morning, your medical and emotional health issues, your ability to remember or problems with your vision (this was the type of questions the Nazis asked the Jews before they gassed them) how much income each person who lives in your household makes, ethnicity, country of origin, age, date of birth, social security, veteran status, student loans, how you get to work, how old your kids are, their names and where they go to school, what disabilities you have.
They want to know how many cars you have, how big your place is and when it was built. They want to know how many people live at your place, their ages and relationship to you, if they are students and where do they attend? They ask how many phones, bathrooms, johns, showeres, and tubs you have and if you’re a citizen or not. They ask how much you spend on utilites and how you heat your place. They ask how much your rent/mortgage and real estate property taxes are. They want to know if you pay condominum or homeowner association fees and what kind of kitchen facilities you have. They ask how big your lot/acreage is, do you run a business from home, do you collect food stamps or welfare, what level of education have you completed, what your disabilites are, your ancestry, your age, your ability to speak English, and how long it takes you to commute to work.
THIS IS MANDATORY AND THE PERSONS ASKING FOR IT MAY VERY WELL BE “INDIVIDUALS SEEKING TO MAKE TRANSITION FROM WELFARE TO WORK”, PER PUBLIC LAW 105-19 TITLE II SECITON 299 PASSED ON NOVEMBER 26, 1997 WHICH IS AN AMENDMENT TO TITLE 13. THE AMENDMENT’S WHEREAS STATES THAT CONGRESS WANTS “MAXIMIZED CENSUS EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES FOR INDIVIDUALS SEEKING TO MAKE TRANSITION FROM WELFARE TO WORK”. NOW ISN’T THAT JUST FRIGGING TOO DAMN SPECIAL, IN THIS ERA OF IDENTITY THIEF, YOUR GOVT WANTS TO ASK YOU TO TRUST THEM TO DELIVER BASICALLY YOUR ENTIRE LIFE INTO THE HANDS OF AN UNKNOWN WORKER WHO LIKELY JUST GOT OFF OF WELFARE, WHOOPS! I MEANT “AN INDIVIDUAL MAKING THE TRANSITION”. BULLCR*P, I AM FED UP WITH BUREACRATS PUSHING THE TAX-PAYING PUBLIC AROUND.
THE GOVERNMENT HAS NO BUSINESS IN MY FAMILY LIFE, MY MEDICAL OR ECONOMIC LIFE, THEY SHOULD BE COUNTING ME, NOT AUDITING ME! THE RESULTS OF THIS SURVEY WILL BE USED BU GOVT TO SELL YOUR INFORMATION EVENTUALLY, (THEY’LL SAY THEY ARE GOING TO “AMONYITIZE” IT, BULLSHI*, GET REAL, THEY GOT ALL YOUR INFO, YOU THINK THAT THEY’RE GONNA “UN-GET” YOUR INFO? OF COURSE NOT? HELL, THEY’LL HAVE DOSSIERS ON YOUR KIDS BEFORE THEY’RE EVEN BORN (BASED ON THE FERTILITY SECTION) THE BUREAUCRACY & POLITICOS JUST WANTS SCREW WITH THE “RESULTS” WHICH YOU CAN EASILY SEE WHAT THEY WILL BE BY READING ALL OF THE QUESITONS) TO SHORE UP MORE FUNDS FOR MORE PEOPLE TO SIT ON THEIR ASSES.
What about you?
I recently received the Census Bureau’s ACS and when I looked inside I could scarcely believe what I saw. I was deeply offended and outraged. I am not accustomed to using foul language at all but as I threw the ACS in the trash I used some language directed at it I haven’t uttered in nearly 20 years. There is no way they could get away with forcing anyone into answering this thing against their wishes. If brought into the public eye there would be a tumultous outrage.
Don’t be intimidated by the lying idea that everyone else is answering the ACS and you should too.
Don’t be intimidated by the lying idea that if you don’t comply that they’ll ruin your life as the IRS has done to so many.
Don’t be intimidated by the lying idea that it is your duty to support your country and not being rebellious.
This ACS asks for information that is none of their business.
Privacy laws prevent even the federal government from gathering this information. If it were legal it would be much simpler and faster for the Feds to simply demand information from the customer databases of other government agencies, utility, educational, and banking institutions and others. Harvesting the data in this fashion could be very quick and quiet. After this was compiled they could simply “fill in the blanks” of missing information on a shorter “more palatable” ACS and have their precious profiles.
One reason they don’t do it that way is because it is illegal, as stated by a previous writer quoting a census taker.
If you’d like to read a well educated and documented perspective you’ll enjoy a piece written by Dr. Edward L. Hudgins Director of Regulatory Studies at the Cato Institute.
I recieved a call this Sunday regarding why I had not sent in the American community survey. As I was in the process of doing my taxes for 2005, I informed the nice lady that she/the federal goverment has the appropriate information already in the form of my tax return from 2004.
I let her know how many folks live at my home and that I was not interested in filling out such an outrageous survey. Apparently there is a law which prohibits the census bureau from trading info with the IRS. I found it baffling and frustrating that I as a taxpayer am being asked to duplicate much of the same info twice. This is an outrageous waste of taxpayer money (nevermind my time).
It baffles me that Olympia Snow made head lines in the Bangor, Maine papers this past Saturday by demanding accountability on those corporations which have been fined for various federal offenses ranging from enviromental to mine safety etc. There are billions of uncollected fines. Where is the acountability?
Instead, some of our elected officials have decided to go after the single taxpayer with threats of legal action. I can imagine an elderly person recieving this notification from the census bureau. In my opinion this action is both unconstituitional and down right predatory.
I plan to contact my elected officials on this matter and my attorney if need be and demand some accountability both ethical and monetary along with some common sense.
To my knowledge, the purpose of the census is to find out how many residents of voting age are in each district. We recieved a “long form” census in 2000. All the information we gave is the head count of anyone 18 years or older. That is all that is required by law. Someone working for the census bureau (a bossy woman) came to our house and we simply told her that we knew the law and were not divulging any more information. She said if we didn’t comply, she would send “U.S.Marshalls”. We told her to go ahead, and never heard from them again. If we get the new long form, we will do the same thing. If we don’t stand up now, things will only get worse. Please, assert your rights. We all have the right to be suspicious of ANYONE who asks for such personal information.
Amen to privacy, I will not answer anyone one who comes to my door about how much my monthly electric bill is, and I won’t start now, I agree with Chad, I will not give anyone Info that I deem private, THAT IS MY RIGHT.
I will not succumb to threats from anyone, also my right is to stand and bear arms, enough of it, like Iraq, how would all of you who want to be so quick to answer these questions like the idea of another country coming in here to your home, grabbing you out of your homes, herding you into detention centers and then cramming down a new form of government down your throats as well as how your going to live, what your going to eat, you wouldn’t like it would you, so go on and answer them and see what happens.
Keep watch because if you don’t the N.W.O will have you for breakfast!