814
Opinion of Stevens, J.
Because the Census Act directs that the tabulation of the total population by States shall be "reported by the Secretary to the President," the Court suggests that it is "like a tentative recommendation" to the President, ante, at 798. This suggestion is misleading because, unlike the typical "tentative recommendation," the census report is a public document. It is released to the public at the same time that it is transmitted to the President.12 By law, the census report is distributed to federal and state agencies because it provides the basis for the allocation of various benefits and burdens among the States under a variety of federal programs. The Secretary also transmits the census figures directly to the States to assist them in redistricting. See 13 U. S. C. § 141(c).
This wide distribution provides further evidence that the
statute does not contemplate the President's changing the Secretary's report. If the President modified the census figures after he received them from the Secretary, the Federal Government and the States would rely on different census results. The Secretary has made clear that the existence of varying "official" population figures is not acceptable.
he would not otherwise enjoy. Such additional grants of authority were implicated in the cases on which the Court relies. See Chicago & Southern Air Lines, Inc. v. Waterman S. S. Corp., 333 U. S. 103 (1948); United States v. George S. Bush & Co., 310 U. S. 371 (1940). The statutory language here will not bear this interpretation. Moreover, whatever purpose the Court wishes to "imagine" for the statute's designating the President as the official responsible for performing the apportionment calculations, the legislative record makes it absolutely clear that the purpose was not to give the President any new discretionary authority over the census. See supra, at 810-812, and n. 6.
12 See United States Department of Commerce News, Bureau of Census, 1990 Census Population for the United States is 249,632,692: Reapportionment Will Shift 19 Seats in the U. S. House of Representatives (Dec. 26, 1990); see also N. Y. Times, Dec. 27, 1990, p. A1, col. 3.
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