Are you insane?
If your ancestors lived in the U.S., they could have faced that question in censuses past.

A census agent surveying a family in Chicago in 1940. Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone, via Getty Images

The Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday about adding a census question that was never universal and has not been asked in decades: whether the respondent is a citizen.

The population count, required every 10 years by the Constitution, has changed with time and political concerns. The first census, in 1790, listed the names of only heads of household. By 1850, the census included all household members, but left out the enslaved.

After the Civil War, race questions became torturous. An article in The Sun of New York in 1890, headlined “A Census Puzzle,” detailed objections to classifying people as Negro, mulatto, quadroon, octoroon, white, Chinese, Japanese or Indian. That version of the question was abandoned by 1900.

Many would also say mental health and competency are hardly simple issues. From 1850 to 1880, census officials gave it a shot, asking if any household members were “deaf and dumb, blind, insane or idiotic.” The question was tweaked for 1890 and then dropped.