Katherine Harris'Authority, etc.
I've now read the main body of the Supreme Court decision
a388.g.akamai.net
Several things stand out to me:
(1) The discussion of dimpled chads, moving and inconsistent standards, etc. on pp. 9-13 is very
thorough and IMHO indisputable.
(2)If the Gore camp had sought a recount in a fair manner using objective,
uniform standards, they likely would have been able to get a complete manual recount within the "safe harbor." By attempting to
manipulate the system in their favor, they blew their chance.
(3)It appears to me that Katherine Harris could have exercised
even more authority here. According to the law, the Secretary of State's job is "to obtain and maintain uniformity in the application,
operation, and interpretation of election laws." This implies to me that she had to power to interpret the election laws, and could
have determined that "dimpled chads," etc. do not meet the standard of "clear intent of the voter" and ordered these votes not
to be counted. Below is the relevant section from the Supreme Court decision:
The legislature has desig-nated
the Secretary of State as the “chief election officer,”
with the responsibility to “[o]btain and maintain uniform-ity
in the application, operation, and interpretation of the
election laws.” §97.012. The state legislature has dele-gated
to county canvassing boards the duties of adminis-tering
elections. §102.141. Those boards are responsible
for providing results to the state Elections Canvassing
Commission, comprising the Governor, the Secretary of
State, and the Director of the Division of Elections.
§102.111. Cf. Boardman v. Esteva, 323 So. 2d 259, 268, n.
5 (1975) (“The election process . . . is committed to the
executive branch of government through duly designated
officials all charged with specific duties . . . . [The] judg-ments
[of these officials] are entitled to be regarded by the
courts as presumptively correct . . . ”). |
