Citizen Advocates for Constitutional Principles


Constitutional Gems - # 650 – 12-18-06




Focusing on the Constitutional - Enumeration Clause, Actual vs. Estimate
The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct.

Those who maintian that the phrase "actual Enumeration" means actual counting of individuals as opposed to the use of estimating methods argue, as Justice Antonin Scalia did in Department of Commerce v. United States House of Representatives (1999), that the words mean "counting 'singly,' 'separately,' 'number by number,' 'distinctly.'" The distinction between actual counting and estimating was well known and thoroughly discussed in both debates in eighteenth-century English politics and in controversies between the American colonies and England. Indeed, the participants in these debates used the precise terms at issue, those who critized the use of estimates in calculating population figures demanded instead that an enumberation - actual count - be taken.

Andrew Spiropoulos, The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, pg. 56

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A Founder’s Profile - Donald Conkey


Thomas Jefferson (1743–1825) was a remarkable man who served America at a critical time in history. A lawyer, he spoke five languages, was a member of the Virginia House of Burgess at 25; delegate to the Second Congress at 32; wrote the Declaration of Independence at 33, was second governor of Virginia at 36, served again in Congress at 41, appointed minister to France at 41, was first Secretary of State at 46, was Vice President at 53, became the third president of the United States at 57, and died within hours of John Adams, on July 4, 1825, the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence – the document he wrote during 17 soul stretching days, 16 of which were devoted to the 339 precise words that make up its first two paragraphs – America's Foundational Document that preceded America's Constitution by eleven years.

Source: The Real Thomas Jefferson – p. xv


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