The COVID-19-delayed results of the 2020 census are finally in, with totals for the 50 states and the District of Columbia, and nearly one-third of a billion for the whole nation: 331,449,281, and also with surprises in the short run and for what French historians call the longue duree.

The short-term news revolves around the function for which the framers of the Constitution mandated the world’s first regularly scheduled census: the reapportionment of seats of the House of Representatives among the states. That’s done according to a 1941 statutory formula that the Census Bureau conveniently applies.