no harm" argument is not relevant to the case at hand
Harm is relevant in this case because it was demonstrated. But I was responding to your statement. You stated this:
But if one precinct throws 20% of its ballots into the trash while another counts them perfectly, that is NOT an equal protection clause violation because it's okay to count differently as long as you use different voting machines.
And take this into the context of your original question:
The question is, did the USC implicitly declare that Florida's entire voting procedure (& that of a lot of other states, as well) violated the equal protection clause?
The answer is no, it is only the recount procedure declared to be unconstitutional. The court was quite specific, As I have discussed in previous posts.
then you changed the question
why do we have to wait for the recount before declaring that a violation of the equal protection clause has occurred? That is the basic question
Which I have answered.
The USC prevented this by declaring, on December 12, that December 12 was a binding date for deciding the election.
That is a completely different issue than we have been discussing. That is a discussion on whether or not the case should have been remanded , and allowing the recounts to continue after the finding of equal protection violation. This discussion, would involve interpretation of 3USC, and the highly esoteric discussion of when to defer to the state court, when to intervene and did the FSC violate the intent of the legislature. There are at least 3 different SCOTUS opinions in the Bush v. Gore case on that one.
I don't think so. You are raising objections to the earlier Broward, Palm and Miami/Dade recounts; I was refering to the recount proceeding under Judge Lewis' supervision
Nope. The FSC ordered recount only had Judge Lewis doing the Miami-Dade recount. All other counties (not previously completed) were done in the counties. And since it was demonstrated that different standards were used, before hand, that were well beyond 'slightly different', the Supreme Court said that the FSC failed to assure fundamental fairness. The fact that they allowed counts that were done in demonstrably different ways, is also a violation.
. I am glad to see that you agree that there is no way telling if there was harm except by actually counting the rejected ballots
With regards to this case (and circumstance), I have never said anything different, so long as ballots are treated equally. I have also said, that if the margin of error is less than the margin of victory, no recount was needed. |
