Covid-19 v. The Framers

 The actual Enumeration, better known as the Census, is already a mess and going to get worse, even though Art.1, Sec. 2 of the Constitution says it must be done.
 The election of the President in November is also on shaky ground. When The New York Times editorial board, conservative columnist Mona Charen and historian Jon Meacham, who is close to the Bushes, all are concerned that someone may decide it shouldn't happen Sec. 1 of Art. 2 may be in trouble, too.
 (When we find ourselves in times of trouble I find myself more attracted to conservative Republicans who have stayed conservative but not Republican -- like Charen and Bret Stephens. And maybe Deacon Jim ;) My current favorite columnist is Michael Gerson, who is an evangelical, to boot. He reads the same authors I do. The people I used to rely on haven't noticed that they ought to explain what they are doing about the trillion-dollar baillout, so there is only The Don's word that they are obstructing it. End of obiter dicta.)
 As to the Census, I filled out our contribution and submitted it today. Our code arrived unheralded. I went to the mailbox, and there it was. Everybody is talking about Covid-19, and there has been putrid advertising for the Census. Maybe the money to advertise went into the futile legal defense for  discouraging brown people from responding by asking about immigration status. Anyhow, it is easy to see a lot of codes going into the trash along with scratch-off tickets with which you may win a car (or not), begging letters from charities that use your contributions to send begging letters and offers to buy your house sight unseen or give you free hearing aids. And most home computers these days are tied up with homework from closed schools and work-at-home jobs.
 The solution is old and tried and once true: Send enumerators door-to-door to find the information that doesn't come through the internet. There may be more need for them than in recent year with on-line reporting being new and that advertising being invisible. Except now is the training period for the enumerators, and no training can be done due to the virus. Maybe Covid-19 will abate with warmer weather and allow for canvassing, but Florida has been having the other states' idea of summer all along, and Florida is tied with Illinois at the moment as fourth among states in number of cases.
 It easily may become impossible to get a full count. One party will not mind if that leaves congressional district lines where the 2010 Census and gerrymandering put them.
 The titular leader of that same party would not mind if the 2020 election has to be postponed for a year or called off completely. It would leave him in charge of the Senate and, better yet, mean he doesn't have to deflect questions about his tax returns. Questions like, whether he still bothers to file.
 It well may be that social distance, or even stay-home orders, are in effect in November. It would be hard to hold an election under such circumstances. But it would be extremely difficult and costly to find a new way to hold elections.
 That is why it is not too early to start talking about it. The Times proffered the idea of vote-by-mail. Some states have that as an option. But Charen pointed out that there is many a slip between applying for a ballot and getting it back in order and in time to be opened.
 And when they are opened, she noted, it would take an army of people keeping social distance to count each and every ballot.
 Meacham noted that during the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln -- to whom the incumbent likes to be compared -- made sure all he soldiers in the field could vote when he came up for re-election in 1864. His advisers told him it was suicide because the Army loved the bloviating Gen. George B. McClellan,  Lincoln's opponent. Turned out, he Army shared Lincoln's view of his opponent. No one would dare to tell The Don that the  public would like someone better, but The Don could find other reasons to call off or postpone the election if the pandemic doesn't weaken significantly. And it has an equal chance of being worse. We do not want to arrive at November as unprepared with ballots as we were unprepared for coronavirus tests.