“‘The superstition of this people is so unsurmountable that I believe I shall never be able to obtain a complete list of the number of inhabitants of this province.’—New York Colonial MSS., vol. v, p. 459.
“He then suggests a computation, based upon returns of militia and of freemen, afterward the women and children, and then the servants and slaves.
“William Burnet, colonial governor of New Jersey, to the Lords of Trade, June 26, 1726, after mentioning returns made in 1723, says:
“‘I would have then ordered the like accounts to be taken in New Jersey, but I was advised it might make the people uneasy, they being generally of a New England extraction, and thereby enthusiasts; and that they would take it for a repetition of the same sin that David committed in numbering the people, and might bring on the like judgments. This notion put me off from it at the time, but since your lordships desire it, I will give the orders to the sheriffs, that it may be done as soon as may be.’
“That this sentiment has not wholly disappeared, may be seen from the following: At a public meeting held on the evening of November 12, 1867, in this city, pending the taking of the census of the District of Columbia by the Department of Education and the municipal authorities, a speaker, whose name is given in the reported proceedings, said:
“‘I regard the whole matter as illegal. Taking the census is an important matter. In the Bible we are told David ordered Joab to take the census when he had no authority to do so, and Joab was punished for it.’ He thought these parties, the Metropolitan police, should be enjoined from asking questions, and he advised those who had not returned the blank, not to fill it up or answer a single question.
“As early as 1775 the Continental Congress resolved that certain of the burdens of the war should be distributed among the Colonies, ‘according to the number of inhabitants of all ages, including negroes and mulattoes, in each colony;’ and also recommended to the several colonial conventions, councils, or committees of safety, to ascertain the number of inhabitants in each colony, and to make returns to Congress as soon as possible. Such responses as were made to this recommendation, were probably of no great value, and are almost wholly lost.
“The Articles of Confederation, as reported by John Dickinson, in July, 1776, provided for a triennial enumeration of the inhabitants of the States, such enumeration to be the basis of adjusting the ‘charges of war and all other expenses that should be incurred for the common defense or general welfare.’ The eighth of the articles, as they were finally adopted, provided that these charges and expenses should be defrayed out of a common treasury, to be supplied by the several States in ‘proportion to the value of land within each State granted to or surveyed for any person; and such land and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated according to such mode as the United States, in Congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint.’
“The ninth article gave Congress the authority ‘to agree upon the numbers of land forces, and to make requisitions from each of its quota in proportion to the number of white inhabitants in such State.’ These articles, unquestionably contemplated a national census, to include a valuation of land and an enumeration of population, but they led to no substantial results. When the blanks in the revenue report of 1783 were filled, the committee reported that they had been compelled to estimate the population of all the States except New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Maryland.
“The next step is to the Constitutional Convention of 1787. The charter of Government, framed by that body, provided for a national census to be taken decennially. Moreau de Jonnés, a distinguished French writer on statistics, in his ‘Elements de Statistique,’ refers to the constitutional provision in the following elevated language: