It's normal in the sense that it's widespread, but I don't think it's normal in the sense that it makes sense. I don't think it should be that way.
I agree with the government's position that if people need to be forced to provide this information, then there's something wrong there. I don't think it's right that if someone refuses to fill out the long form, he or she has either a fine or a jail term. If the people who are supposedly being helped by the information collected from the census can't be persuaded to fill it out, I don't think they should be forced to under penalty of law.