Cite as: 525 U. S. 316 (1999)
Opinion of the Court
higher undercount rates than the population as a whole. See Census 2000 Report 3-4. Accordingly, in previous censuses, the Bureau sought to increase the number of persons from whom it obtained information. In 1990, for instance, the Bureau attempted to reach out to traditionally under-counted groups by promoting awareness of the census and its importance, providing access to Spanish language forms, and offering a toll free number for those who had questions about the forms. Id., at 4. Indeed, the 1990 census was "better designed and executed than any previous census." Id., at 2. Nonetheless, it was less accurate than its predecessor for the first time since the Bureau began measuring the undercount rate in 1940. Ibid.
In a further effort to address growing concerns about undercount in the census, Congress passed the Decennial Census Improvement Act of 1991, which instructed the Secretary to contract with the National Academy of Sciences (Academy) to study the "means by which the Government could achieve the most accurate population count possible." § 2(a)(1), 105 Stat. 635, note following 13 U. S. C. § 141. Among the issues the Academy was directed to consider was "the appropriateness of using sampling methods, in combination with basic data-collection techniques or otherwise, in the acquisition or refinement of population data." Ibid. Two of the three panels established by the Academy pursuant to this Act concluded that "[d]ifferential undercount cannot be reduced to acceptable levels at acceptable costs without the use of integrated coverage measurement," a statistical sampling procedure that adjusts census results to account for undercount in the initial enumeration, Census 2000 Report 7-8, and all three panels recommended including integrated coverage measurement in the 2000 census, id., at 29. See National Research Council, Preparing for the 2000 Census: Interim Report II (A. White & K. Rust eds. 1997) (report of Panel to Evaluate Alternative Census Methodologies); Modernizing the U. S. Census, supra (report of Panel
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