this legal language, some precedents roughly analogous, for example Darby v. State ex rel. McCollough, 75 So. 411 (Fla. 1917) (per curiam), and somewhat similar findings from courts across the country, see the cases cited below, at 152, the Florida Supreme Court concluded that the term “legal vote” refers to a recorded vote on a ballot, which clearly reflects what the voter intended to do. Gore vs. Harris, 772 Sun. 2d 1243, 1254 (2000). This conclusion is different from the Secretary`s conclusion. But nothing in Florida law requires the Florida Supreme Court to accept the secretary`s view on such an issue as decisive. Nor can it be said that the court`s final decision is so unreasonable that it amounts to an “undue distortion” of Florida law. Nor can the third element be characterized as an “unconscionable distortion” if one understands that there are two sides to the argument of the opinion that the Florida Supreme Court “has virtually eliminated ministerial discretion.” Ante, at 115, 118 (REHNQUIST, C.
J., pairing). The Florida law in question was amended in 1999 to provide that “grounds for challenging an election” include “the rejection of a series of legal votes sufficient to.” Questioning the outcome of the election. Fla. Stat. Ann. §§ 102.168(3), (3)(c) (Supp. 2001). And the parties argued over the correct meaning of the term “legal vote” in the law. The minister said a “legal vote” is a vote that is “properly executed in accordance with the instructions for all registered voters.” Letter to the respondent Harris et al. 10. According to this interpretation, punched card ballots for which machines cannot record a vote are not “legal” votes. Id., p.
14. The Florida Supreme Court did not accept their definition. But there was a reason. The reason for this was that another provision of Florida`s election laws (a provision dealing with damaged or defective ballots) states that no vote can be ignored “if there is a clear indication of the voter`s intent as determined by the Board of Electors” (adding that ballots should not be counted “if it is impossible to determine the voter`s choice”). Fla. Stat. Ann. § 101.5614(5) (Supp. 2001). In the Court`s view, the national norm (according to which a “legal vote” is a “vote in which there is a `clear indication of the voter`s intention`”[45]) could not guarantee that each county would count votes in a constitutionally permissible manner.
The Court noted that the applicability of the per-curiam opinion “is limited to the current circumstances, as the problem of equal protection in electoral processes generally presents many complexities”. However, the Court did not elaborate on what these complexities were, nor did it explain (or apparently consider) why the absence of a constitutionally acceptable standard for vote counting, which was the basis of the Court`s decision, would not have invalidated the entire presidential election in Florida. [46] Nevertheless, Gore dropped the case – and cleared George W. Bush called the 2000 U.S. presidential election shortly after, supposedly because he was not optimistic about how Florida judges would react to other arguments, and, as one of his advisers put it, “the best Gore could hope for was a list of controversial voters.” [49] In addition, Gore Campaign Chairman Bill Daley argued that it was pointless to continue fighting because even if the Florida Supreme Court defied the United States. The Supreme Court ordered a recount: “The GOP would bring them directly back to Washington, where the Supreme Court repeated, `You`re not going to count, okay? So stop bothering us. [50] Bush v. Gore has been used contradictorily in various cases, both to disqualify a large number of ballots and to ensure that ballots are not arbitrarily rejected. Shortly after the 2018 election, for example, the re-election campaign of Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson and a committee of the state`s Democratic Party filed a federal lawsuit challenging the way Florida election officials verified signatures on absentee ballots and provisional ballots. When a state allows residents to vote by mail, the campaign`s legal team argued in a submission based on Bush v. Gore, the equality clause prohibits the state from “luring its voters into a procedurally arbitrary mail-in voting trap that leads to their disenfranchisement.” In response to Nelson`s lawsuit, the courts lamented “the lack of formal Florida training standards or requirements” for those who evaluate ballot signatures, as well as the state`s inability to inform some Floridians in time to correct inappropriately rejected ballots. A judge asked the state to give these voters up to 11 days after the election to provide affidavits and proof of identity so their votes count.
(Despite this interim victory, Nelson failed and lost his seat.) Bush v. Gore was a case before the U.S. Supreme Court in which that court overturned a request by the Florida Supreme Court for a selective manual recount of votes cast in the 2000 U.S. presidential election. The verdict effectively gave Florida`s 25 votes to the Electoral College — and thus the election itself — to Republican candidate George W.
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