THE FINAL MOVES.

The strangest election in U.S. history goes down for the count

With slashing lawyers, dueling press conferences, screaming matches across barricades, and fierce arguments over something called "pregnant chads," the 2000 presidential election has had a little bit of everything American democracy has to offer--except for a quick and clean conclusion. Instead, every moment of apparent finality so far has inevitably turned into a new beginning.

And each turn has made history. This presidential election is one of the closest in history, the first to be contested in the courts, the first to be disputed since 1876. With Vice President Al Gore winning the national popular vote by 337,000 out of nearly 100 million votes cast, Texas Governor George W. Bush could become the first president since 1888 to govern without winning the popular vote. And as this issue went to press, it still wasn't over.

AND STILL COUNTING ...

Nineteen days after the election, Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris declared Bush the winner in Florida, whose 25 electoral votes would put him over the top, by a grand total of 537 out of 5.8 million Florida votes. An hour later, Bush claimed victory in the national contest. But the race was anything but over. Vice President Al Gore, saying the vote total left out ballots that would give him the victory, challenged the results in Florida State Court. The U.S. Supreme Court was scheduled to hear arguments on the election later in the week, and the Florida state legislature, dominated by Republicans, was considering taking matters into its own hands.

Election 2000 has challenged many basic notions that American had about the electoral process, reminding skeptics that every vote does count, while creating grave doubts about whether every vote gets counted. The partisan postelection contest has also raised questions about how the next President will lead a divided country. And it has opened a fierce debate over the role played by the courts and legislatures in the process.

The eye of the storm was in Florida, where the vote was closer than its margin of error--the normal percentage of mistakes made by counting machines. Statistically, experts say, the Florida vote was a tie. With so few votes separating them, Gore asked for recounts in four counties where voting machines failed to register presidential votes on tens of thousands of ballots. Democrats insist those ballots, when examined by hand, will show votes for president. "Ignoring votes means ignoring democracy itself," Gore says, defending the Democratic quest for votes.

Bush's lawyers went to court to block the recount, arguing that while machines may miss some votes, recounting ballots by hand introduces the possibility of mischief and subjectivity. "Some are determined to keep counting in an effort to change the legitimate result," Bush says.

POSSIBILITY OF MISCHIEF

That case went to the Florida Supreme Court, which ruled that the recounts should go on, but only until 5 p.m. on November 26. By then, two of the four counties, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach, hadn't finished counting. Harris, who also happened to be Bush's campaign cochair in Florida, declared Bush the winner. Gore's lawyers immediately filed a challenge in Florida State Court, claiming that if the late recounts were included, Gore would be the winner.

The Florida legislature, arguing that the U.S. Constitution gives it the power to choose electors for the Electoral College, then met to consider taking the election into its own hands, and declaring Bush the Florida winner.

Gore and Bush even battled over what constitutes a vote. The four contested counties all use punch-card ballots, in which the voter must poke a hole in a card next to the candidate's name (see "Voting," page 11). But in many cases, the chad--the little square of card that is supposed to fall out of the hole--remained attached to the ballot or was only slightly "dimpled," giving rise to the famous "pregnant chad."

Hanging chads were counted, but Republicans argued that dimpled chads shouldn't count, winning their argument in some counties while losing in others. Meanwhile, Bush's lawyers also went to federal court to argue that the hand recounts in selected counties violated the constitutional right of "equal protection of the law" for voters in counties that were not being recounted. That case was to be heard in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Whatever the decision, larger questions will remain when the dust clears. Historians say that recent Presidents have had success even after close elections. They point to John Kennedy's narrow victory over Richard Nixon in 1960, and even Bill Clinton's victory with only 43 percent of the vote in 1992. But they say this time the new President may face even greater obstacles.

GRIDLOCK ALERT

"Those [situations] were not easy," says Larry Sabato, a professor of political science at the University of Virginia. "But because the electorate is so divided, there are more opportunities for gridlock now, and that's tough."

Worse, some observers fear, the fight could lead voters to distrust the system. Although judges take an oath of impartiality, allegations of partisanship have been raised. When the Florida Supreme Court sided with Gore, Bush supporters fiercely criticized the court, in which seven of eight Justices were appointed by Democratic Governors. Bush has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, where seven of nine Justices were appointed by Republican Presidents.

But with the Electoral College scheduled to vote on December 18, not everyone is pessimistic. To some, this political morass is just the messy business of democracy at work. "Nobody is storming the capital," says Stephen Hess, a political analyst with the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. "Given how these things work in other countries, I think you have to stress how the system appears to be working."

WHO'S IN CONTROL

Congress will be the most closely divided since 1955, when Republicans held a seven-seat edge in the two houses. The Senate has been tied just twice before.

[GRAPH OMITTED]

The Pulse of Palm Beach

What do people at the heart of the controversy think? To find out, UPFRONT interviewed students at Atlantic Community High School in Palm Beach County, Florida.

It's been crazy. I seriously think there should be a re-vote in Palm Beach County because the ballot was confusing. I heard that the ballot broke two state laws anyway and one is that the two main party candidates are supposed to be the first two holes. If I was that lady who designed that ballot, I would lock myself in my house and never come out, I would be so afraid.

My mother is from El Salvador and they have problems when they change the President if a wide majority does not like him. She told me when she was younger the President changed and they had a mass revolt. She couldn't

lucky in this country. She showed me how it's such a big deal in the United States and it's so important and just beautiful that you can do that here and not have to worry about who you vote for and maybe a revolt breaking out.

ALAN BILLINGS 18, LAKE WORTH

I really do regret not to vote in as close It would be something to tell my grandkids when I'm like 80 that t was involved in the second election in history that was that close, and that my county was the one that kind of messed up the national election.

JUSTIN POLLACK, 17, BOCA RATON 

I think the way they voted here was a little archaic. Other states have it on a touch screen. We have the technology to all vote this way, why not use it?

EMILY GHIJSELINCK, 17, DELRAY BEACH 

I went to one the protests with a friend. We weren't for one party or the other. We wanted them to see that they should take time with this, that they shouldn't rush to get a President because we already have one, that they should just try to do what's fair--not be so much a Republican or a Democrat, but an American.

SAMEER VERMA, 17, GULFSTREAM

It's truly not good to say, "Too bad," but you also cannot do a re-vote. To do a re-vote in Palm Beach County, you'd have to do a national re-vote Because now the saying other people in other states vote properly.

SCOTT RUBENSTEIN, BOCA RATON

VOTING: Time to Upgrade?

At a time when you can stick a card in an ATM machine and walk away with cash, why are millions of Americans still voting with archaic and inaccurate technology?

The Constitution spells out many election rules, but when it comes to casting votes, states and local governments are left to their own devices. That has led to the current underfunded, headache-inducing mix of methods.

"We vote as if we still live in the 19th century," says Senator Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.). He has proposed a federal study to figure out a national standard and to provide $250 million to help states make necessary updates.

Voters in some counties are able to use touch-screen systems or optically scanned ballots (filled in with a No. 2 pencil, like the SATs), but 37 percent are stuck with punch cards, a relic of the 1960s, and 20 percent use lever machines, which originated about 100 years ago. The punch-card system used in some Florida counties ranges from 99 to 99.99 percent accurate, according to the machine's manufacturers. But in Florida alone, that margin of error could mean thousands of miscounted votes.

Voting via the Internet appears to be the inevitable 21st-century upgrade. Alaska tried it out first in a Republican straw poll last January. Arizona followed in March, with 17,000 people logging Internet votes in the Democratic primary. Good as it sounds, e-voters faced congestion and software glitches. Moreover, experts are concerned that virtual voting could fall prey to hackers.

Says Todd Urosevich of Election Systems and Software Inc., "There isn't a voting technoloqy you'd be able to say, `Gee, this is perfect.'"

FOCUS: Why Election 2000 Became Entwined in State and Federal Courts

TEACHING OBJECTIVES

To help students understand what happened in Florida's presidential voting and how the close outcome could affect the new President's ability to govern.

Discussion Questions:

* Suppose a student from another country asks you What went wrong with the 2000 presidential election. How would you answer?

* Was the election dispute a crisis in American government?

* Who is to blame if ballots are improperly cast, the designer or the voters?

* Do you believe the confusion in this year's presidential election will influence voter turnout in the 2002 congressional elections or the 2004 presidential election?

CLASSROOM STRATEGIES

Election Crisis: Write "separation of powers" on the board. Then note the role of the courts in Election 2000. Ask students why state and federal courts entered the election process.

Debate: Students can defend each of these statements: (1) Florida's Supreme Court rewrote election law; it usurped the role of the legislature when it allowed recounts beyond the deadline. (2) The court rightfully extended the deadline for vote counting, because accurate counts are more important than deadlines.

Discussion: Note that the U.S. Supreme Court normally hears constitutional issues. So why did it accept Bush's appeal? (Bush said selective recounts denied some voters the equal protection of the law, as in the 14th Amendment.)

Next, address the role of legislatures in elections. Note that the Constitution allows Congress to set the "times, places, and manner of holding elections" for Congress (17th Amendment, Article I). It also sets dates for presidential elections. But state laws govern all other election matters. Ask students whether events in Florida suggest the need for greater federal regulation or standardization of elections. What are the pros and cons of increased federal control or uniform national election regulations?

Critical Thinking: Many people wonder if the close election will hurt the new President. Have students discuss this--and the close split in Congress. Is the U.S. facing four years of political stalemate? What could both sides do to prevent such a development?