22
Opinion of the Court
ducted via a simple "headcount," thereby ignoring the fact that statistical adjustment had been used in both the 1970 and 1980 censuses. See Brief for Respondents 4-5.
We need not tarry long with this argument. The Secretary reasonably recognized that a PES-based statistical adjustment would be a significant change from the traditional method of conducting the census. The statistical adjustments in 1970 and 1980 to which respondents refer were of an entirely different type than the adjustment considered here, and they took place on a dramatically smaller scale. See Cuomo v. Baldrige, 674 F. Supp., at 1107 (rejecting argument that Secretary had to conduct PES-like statistical adjustment of 1980 census and finding that "none of [the] adjustments in 1970 were even remotely similar to the types of wholesale adjustments presently suggested . . ."). Moreover, the PES-based adjustment would have been the first time in history that the States' apportionment would have been based upon counts in other States. See Pet. App. 251a-252a. Here, the Secretary's understanding of the traditional method of conducting the census was well founded, as was his establishment of a rebuttable presumption that the traditional method was the most accurate.
The Secretary ultimately determined that the available evidence "tends to support the superior distributive accuracy of the actual enumeration," id., at 185a, and it is this determination at which respondents direct the brunt of their attack. Respondents contend that the Secretary's review of the evidence is due no deference from this Court. They argue that the Secretary's decision is not the sort of "highly technical" administrative decision that normally commands judicial deference, and that regardless of its technical complexity, the Secretary's review of the evidence presents a constitutional issue that deserves no deference. Respondents contend that the Secretary's review of the evidence is of dubious validity because the Secretary is admittedly "not a statistician," id., at 139a, and because his conclusion is at
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