How is contiguous defined?
MARTHA: One of the things that happens in this measurement business is that we are constantly having to redefine as circumstances changes. For instance, what is contiguous in a Congressional District might be different in a time of urbanization compared to a time when people were on farms. We are constantly defining things like what is a family in measurement terms. For instance, we now define a family as blood relatives living under the same roof. Well, what does that mean to a child whose parents are divorced and live some place else? It makes the parent the child lives with a single parent, but the child actually has two parents. Or if the child goes to both parents, lives with both parents, the child is arbitrarily assigned to one because of this placing and measuring business. In Canada there’s been a proposal to redefine family as people who are related by blood and who interact with one another, say, for caretaking but you don’t necessarily have to live together. I have many col
