# Baldrige v. Shapiro **455 U.S. 345 (1982)**, decided unanimously, Chief Justice Burger writing. The controlling authority on whether anyone outside the [[Census Bureau]] can compel production of raw census data. The answer is no, on two independent grounds. The Court held that **§§ 8(b) and 9(a) of [[Title 13]] qualify as withholding statutes under Exemption 3 of the [[Freedom of Information Act]]**, so raw census data is exempt from FOIA without any public-interest balancing. It further held that the same provisions create a **statutory privilege under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b)(1)**, shielding census information from civil discovery regardless of how relevant or necessary it is to the litigation. The sharpest part of the holding concerns **master address lists**. The cities of Essex, Connecticut and Denver, Colorado sought their own address lists to challenge what they believed were undercounts. The Court held that address lists **are** raw census data — they consist of information reported by or on behalf of individuals — and that a municipality could not obtain them even while pledging statistical use only. The practical consequence is that a city that suspects a [[Census Undercount]] cannot get the data that would let it prove where. Mapped as "the wall" in [[Census Data Access Crosswalk]]. See [[Census]] · [[Department of Commerce v. New York]] · [[Missouri v. Department of Commerce]]