US Census records are produced through the offices of the Census Bureau of the United States federal government, as has been tasked with carrying out nationally applicable and accordingly wide-ranging surveys of the country’s current population, including those both legally registered and illegally resident, at decade-long intervals.
The United States Census is accordingly carried out upon the population of the country through a conception of the nation as comprising four distinct regions, identified as the Northeast, Midwest, South, and West, as well as from nine divisions, each representing a portion of one of the US Census data regions.
Accordingly, US Census records will be produced from one of the United States Census Divisions of the possible choices, starting at Division 1 and proceeding upward, of the Northeast’s New England and Mid-Atlantic, the Midwest’s East North Central and West North Central, the South’s South Atlantic, East South Central, and West South Central, and the West’s Mountain and Pacific United States Census division.
US Census records as individual pieces of documentation are used by the government and the elected representatives and appointed officials who administer it for the purpose of adjusting policy to the needs of the US populace as it is currently made out. In this regard, US Census data is inaccessible to the public for a 72-year period starting from its initial point of being collected. Instead, US Census data is made available to the public in the form of statistics and other summaries, while the complete US Census records are held at the National Archives.