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example, back in 1966, Hawaii used the number of registered voters, rather than the census of population, to draw its legislative districts, and had its plan upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Burns v. Richardson, 384 U.S. 73. But there the Court found that the results based on registered voters were not substantially different from the results based on the total population count. A state may conduct its own census on which to base its redistricting plans. For example, a 1979 Kansas legislative redistricting plan based on the state's 1978 agricultural census was upheld by a federal district court in the case of Bacon v. Carlin, 575 F. Supp. 763 (D. Kan. 1983), aff'd 466 U.S. 966 (1984). And in 1986, a Massachusetts legislative redistricting plan based on a state census was upheld by a federal district court in the case of McGovern v. Connolly, 637 F. Supp. 111 (D. Mass 1986). Late in the decade, a federal court may find that local government estimates are a more accurate reflection of current population than old census counts and thus are an acceptable basis for developing redistricting plans before the next census. Garza v. County of Los Angeles, Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, No. CV 88 -5143 KN (Ex) (C.D. Cal. June 4, 1990). But generally, the federal courts will not simply accept an alternative basis used by the states. Rather, they will first check to see whether the districts are of substantially equal population based on Census Bureau figures. If they are not, the courts will strike them down. So, if you want your plans to stand up in court, the easiest way is use official Census Bureau population counts. 2. Use of Sampling to Eliminate Undercount For the year 2000 census, as there was for the 1990 census, there has been a political fight over how the population should be counted. In the 1990s, the main political fight over how to count the population concerned how to compensate for the historic undercounting of racial and ethnic minorities. In response to a suit by the City of New York and other plaintiffs that sought to compel the Census Bureau to make a statistical adjustment to the population data to account for people the Bureau failed to count, the Bureau agreed to make a fresh determination of whether there should be a statistical adjustment for an undercount or overcount in the 1990 census. The Bureau agreed to conduct a post enumeration survey of at least 150,000 households to use as the basis for the adjustment. The Bureau agreed that, by July 15, 1991, it would either publish adjusted population data or would publish its reasons for not making the adjustment. Any population data published before then, such as the state totals published December 31, 1990, and the block totals published April 1, 1991, would contain a warning that they were subject to correction by July 15. The Bureau ultimately decided not to make a statistical adjustment to correct for the undercount, and the Supreme Court found that its decision was reasonable and within the discretion of the Secretary of Commerce, in whose Department the Census Bureau is located. Wisconsin v. City of New York, 517 U.S. 1 (1996). For the 2000 census, the fight has been over whether to use scientific sampling techniques to conduct the census from the beginning, rather than adjusting the population counts after they have been issued. The Census Bureau proposed that, in order to obtain information on at least 90 percent of the households in each census tract, it would use statistical sampling techniques to estimate the characteristics of the households that did not respond to the first two