478
Opinion of the Court
ture of the Framers' concerns. Insofar as Justice Thomas proves that the Framers chose to use population, rather than wealth or a combination of the two, as the basis for representation, post, at 500-503, we agree with him. What he does not show, however, is that, in order to avoid bias or for other reasons, they prescribed, or meant to prescribe, the precise method by which Congress was to determine the population. And he cannot show the latter because, for the most part, the choice to base representation on population, like the other fundamental choices the Framers made, are matters of general principle that do not directly help determine the issue of detailed methodology before us. Declaration of Jack N. Rakove in Department of Commerce v. United States House of Representatives, O. T. 1998, No. 98-404, p. 387 ("What was at issue . . . were fundamental principles of representation itself . . . not the secondary matter of exactly how census data was [sic] to be compiled").
Nonetheless, certain basic constitutional choices may prove relevant. The decisions, for example, to use population rather than wealth, to tie taxes and representation together, to insist upon periodic recounts, and to take from the States the power to determine methodology all suggest a strong constitutional interest in accuracy. And an interest in accuracy here favors the Bureau. That is because, as we have said, the Bureau uses imputation only as a last resort— after other methods have failed. In such instances, the Bureau's only choice is to disregard the information it has, using a figure of zero, or to use imputation in an effort to achieve greater accuracy. And Bureau information provided in the District Court suggests that those efforts have succeeded. U. S. Dept. of Commerce, Economics and Statistics Admin., Census 2000 Informational Memorandum No. 110, App. 445- 448 (concluding that postcensus research confirms that imputation appropriately included individuals in the census who would otherwise have been excluded).
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