Census Quotes

• According to the U.S. Census, the most common reason people give for not voting is that they were too busy or had conflicting work or school schedules.

  Jeff Miller

  School, People, Giving

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• People resist a census, but give them a profile page and they'll spend all day telling you who they are.

  Max Barry

  People, Giving, Pages

  Max Barry (2013). “Lexicon”, p.128, Hachette UK

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• The true test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops - no, but the kind of man the country turns out.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Country, Character, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1971). “The Collected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Society and solitude”, p.16, Harvard University Press

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• I hope all of you are going to fill out your census form when it comes in the mail next month. If you don't return the form the area you live in might get less government money and you wouldn't want that to happen, would you.

  Andy Rooney

  Government, Want, Might

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• The government has become a mechanism for distributing largess, and your census form is your ticket.

  Tom G. Palmer

  Government, Tickets, Form

  Tom G. Palmer (2009). “Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice”, p.403, Cato Institute

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• A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

  Anthony Hopkins

  Movie, Nice, Great Year

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• Shall we then judge a country by the majority, or by the minority? By the minority, surely.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Country, Pride, Gay

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.2360, Delphi Classics

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• The first census in 1790 asked just six questions: the name of the head of the household, the number of free white males older than 16, the number of free white males younger than 16, the number of free white females, the number of other free persons, and the number of slaves.

  Tom G. Palmer

  Names, White, Numbers

  Tom G. Palmer (2009). “Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice”, p.402, Cato Institute

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• The U.S. Census Bureau reports that American homes are 650 square feet larger today than they were in 1980. Unfortunately, so are most Americans.

  Conan O'Brien

  Home, Squares, Census Bureau

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• Sampling, statisticians have told us, is a much more effective way of getting a good census.

  Rob Lowe

  Sampling, Way, Statistician

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• At the last census it indicated that about 22 per cent of Australians were born overseas.

  Julie Bishop

  Lasts, Born, Cents

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• I don't think the government is out to get me or help someone else get me but it wouldn't surprise me if they were out to sell me something or help someone else sell me something. I mean, why else would the Census Bureau want to know my telephone number?

  Andy Rooney

  Mean, Thinking, Numbers

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• The reason the government sells the census as your ticket to getting goodies - rather than as your civic duty - is that distributing goodies is now all the government does.

  Tom G. Palmer

  Government, Doe, Tickets

  Tom G. Palmer (2009). “Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice”, p.401, Cato Institute

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• Certainly, last year we did an episode about the census and sampling versus a direct statistic. You just said the word 'census', and people fall asleep.

  Aaron Sorkin

  Fall, Years, People

  Interview with Terence Smith, www.pbs.org. September 27, 2000.

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• There is a shortage of teachers but the January 2001 schools census showed that teacher numbers were at their highest level than at any time since 1984 - and 11,000 higher than 1997.

  Estelle Morris, Baroness Morris of Yardley

  Teacher, School, Numbers

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• The chief instrument of American statistics is the census, which should accomplish a two-fold object. It should serve the country by making a full and accurate exhibit of the elements of national life and strength, and it should serve the science of statistics by so exhibiting general results that they may be compared with similar data obtained by other nations.

  James A. Garfield

  Country, Science, Data

  Garfield, James A. (1882). “The works of James Abram Garfield. Volume 1”, p.456, Best Books on

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• You can't choose between right and wrong by taking a census.

  Elizabeth Taylor

  Decision, Decision Making

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• We didn't think taxes ought to go up. They ought to go down. We didn't think the census ought to be weakened.

  Pete du Pont

  Thinking, Taxes, Ought

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• I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti

  Thomas Harris

  Movie, Nice, Great Year

  "The Silence of the Lambs". www.imdb.com. 1991.

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• Shall we then judge a country by the majority, or by the minority? By the minority, surely. 'Tis pedantry to estimate nations by the census, or by square miles of land, or other than by their importance to the mind of the time.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Country, Land, Squares

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1983). “Essays and Lectures”, p.1081, Library of America

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• ...the number of saintly men has not yet risen to the level where the census makes them a separate statistical category.

  George Stigler

  Men, Numbers, Levels

  George Joseph Stigler, Paul Anthony Samuelson (1963). “A Dialogue on the Proper Economic Role of the State”

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• If we look at American history, between 1942 and 1947, the data that was collected by the Census Bureau was handed over to the FBI and other organizations at the request of President Roosevelt, and that's how the Japanese were rounded up and put into the internment camps.

  Michele Bachmann

  Data, Census Bureau, Organization

  "Bachmann Warns Of Link Between Census, Japanese Internment". Fox News Interview, talkingpointsmemo.com. June 25, 2009.

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• The secret language of statistics, so appealing in a fact-minded culture, is employed to sensationalize, inflate, confuse, and oversimplify. Statistical terms and statistical methods are necessary in reporting the mass data of social and economic trends, business conditions, 'opinion' polls, the census. But without writers who use the words with honesty and understanding and readers who know what they mean, the result can only be semantic nonsense.

  Darrell Huff

  Honesty, Mean, Data

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• Look at the Bethlehem birth. A king ordered a census. Joseph was forced to travel. Mary, as round as a ladybug, bounced on a donkey's back. The hotel was full. The hour was late. The event was one big hassle. Yet, out of the hassle, hope was born. It still is.

  Max Lucado

  Kings, Ladybugs, Events

  Source: www.biblegateway.com

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• A census taker tried to quantify me once. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a big Amarone. Go back to school, little Starling.

  Thomas Harris

  School, Littles, Bigs

  The Silence of the Lambs ch. 3 (1991)

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