I did leave a word or two out there, didn’t I?
I have written many a letter of reference. If I’m honestly able to do, I talk in specifics, and cover all areas of the person’s competence. If I can’t, I don’t. Without going into detail, I’m often in a situation where giving a reference letter, or something very akin to it, is unavoidable. My choices are (a) glowing reference, (b) reference that specifically praises some attributes, but is otherwise vague or avoids certain problem issues; or (c) saying something negative that will screw up someone’s career. Unless someone is truly irredeemable, I don’t choose (c). And (d) - refusing to say anything - is not possible in some circumstances.
I think the thing I didn’t like about ‘R’ was that he seemed inconsistent in his rulings in the politically charged cases. States rights or not states rights? Which is it?
As much as I don’t like what I see with Roberts, the one thing I suspect is that he’ll be consistent.
OK, I quoted Ruth Bader Ginsburg earlier (who was quite laudatory - more than one would have expected if she was simply being courteous).
Now, to be intellectually honest (with myself, at least), I draw your attention to this rather unequivocal characterization of Rehnquist by Alan Dershowitz.
Here’s a sample of the Dershowitz piece:
Both of those statements are true; that is, Bush v. Gore DID stop the recounts, and Bush WAS the winner.
However, the implied causation - that Bush ONLY won because the recount was stopped - is false.
An independent review, performed by a consortium of 8 newspapers finished the recount and found that Bush would have won even if the recount was allowed to continue.
That isn’t to say that Bush got more votes, though. The recount, per Gore’s request, only affected a few heavily-Democratic counties. It was only this recount that mattered in the courts - a statewide recount was never ordered.
Ironically, the person who suggested the statewide recount was Bush – and had a statewide recount had been ordered, Gore most likely would have won (depending on which criteria were used - as someone pointed out earlier, different counties had different criteria).
Gore got more votes, but Bush won the election fair and square.
I don’t know enough about Rehnquist’s history to comment on most of Dershowitz’ claims. Maybe Rehnquist was a Nazi and a thug in his early years, and maybe he lied during his confirmation hearings. I simply don’t know.
I will say that the Dershowitz article gave off an odor of a partisan hatchet job, even before I read this part:
After I read this, I knew for sure that Dershowitz wasn’t being honest - that he was deliberately slanting the facts in his anti-Rehnquist attack. Not that the title to the house didn’t contain a restrictive covenant as claimed. I’m assuming that it did. But Deshowitz leaves something out - deliberately - in order to elicit a conclusion that this proves antisemitism.
Here’s what he fails to tell his readers (who are not likely to be lawyers or land title professionals). It was extremely common 75 or 100 years ago for property developers and other sellers to include such racial or ethnic covenants in deeds. Such covenants run with the land - once there, they continue forever and bind (in theory, anyway) all succeeding owners. Today (of course), no court in the world is going to enforce such a racist covenant. They’re ignored by everyone. Title companies don’t even mention them when they generate title reports. But however unenforceable, they’re still there, sitting in the old title records.
Yet although Dershowitz knows this, he wants the reader to assume that this was somehow part of the recent-day transaction voluntarily negotiated or otherwise accepted by Rehnquist. Odds are, he didn’t even know it was there. If he did, he would have disregarded as having no present-day legal meaning. Just as any lawyer with any knowledge would disregard it, except perhaps as a historical reminder of real bigotry in the past.
[QUOTE=ElvisL1ves]
Actually I was refering to the deadline set up by Florida State law section 102.111
I still contend that the Florida SC is the court that caused the problems. Rather than establishing a standard and interpreting the law, they parroted the “intent of the voter” as set forth under state statute. It extended the statutory deadline for certification by 12 days, basically giving the losing side (in this case Gore) less time to contest the vote before the deadline under 3 USC 5.
But here’s the Florida Supreme Court screwed up with a capital “F”. When the US Supreme Court vacated the ruling extending the deadline, the Florida SC reinstated it. :eek: Perhaps the ruling Bush v. Gore was not so much a pro-Bush statement as it was a smackdown to Fla SC for overruling a USSC over-ruling.
Just answer the question - what is your definition of “clear intent of the voter”? A hanging chad, a dimpled chad, an undervote where the person did not pick Bush? Even Dade County had three different working definitions throughout the recount. So enough of the ambiguous “intent”. What exactly constitutes a vote?
I don’t have to reply since I explained it in my original post. Washington State law allows election officials to modify ballots to make clearer the intent of the voter. This was seen in some areas of King County but observers were not allowed close enough to see. I don’t have a quote of, "I saw them fill in a blank ballot for Gregoire, but charges were made there was ballot tampering but these charges were never investigated. Compound this with the king County election board forgetting to enter signatures in the system (including the head of the board’s signature), losing then finding then finding more ballots in a warehouse, the best case scenerio was that they were incompetent and the worst case is that they were manufacturing a victory. You’ll find this hard to believe, but I like Gregoire and I think that she probably did receive a few more legitimate votes than Rossi, but that still shouldn’t prevent me from pointing out what were IMHO poor rulings by WSSC in allowing different rules to apply for one county (King) in regards to recounts that violated state statute.
Content to dispense? You betcha! Someone who cannot follow basic directions should not be allowed to vote. Be honest, directions for voting are not that difficult and someone that cannot dislodge a chad or made a dark circle cannot needs to realize that that should not constitute a vote. Voting is a right and a responsibility. While we’ll never reach the utopia of most people studying the issues, the least we can expect is to have them poke holes in paper or make dots with a pencil.
Elections are a sham. Nowadays judges step in at a moments notice and try to create the idea that everyone should vote for every office. A chad hanging by two slivers of paper is a vote, a dimpled chad is not. An offcenter dot is a vote, a stray mark is not. It’s getting to the point where people don’t have the right to NOT vote because if you don’t, some canvassing board member will read “intent” all over your pristine ballot. Here’s a novel idea. If you want your vote to count, VOTE PROPERLY!!! Poll workers are there to help if you have any questions. News break - turn over your ballot to make sure all the chads are dislodged.
In this day and age, it is ridiculous that we don’t have clear, unambiguous, unarguable definitions of what constitutes a vote.
I believe the thread asks if Rehnquist was the “worst” Chief Justice, not a “bad” one. It was in that spirit that I discussed those that previous posters had mentioned as being the “worst”.
Do you have a cite for that? My memory is that it was Gore who at one point suggested the statewide recount but that was rejected by Bush. When Gore then went to the Courts to force a recount, he asked for recounts in the certain counties as you noted.
What really matters isn’t Bush’s or Gore’s rhetoris, but what they were asking for in court. And Gore at no time litigated for a statewide recount. He petitioned various courts only for recounts in certain Democratic leaning counties.
Nope. Did you actually read it? The review did not count “overvotes”, where the voter both punched in and wrote in a candidate’s name. Don’t bother arguing about the “clear intent of the voter” there, okay? Do that, in good faith, and Gore wins, as the plurality of Florida voters intended. That cannot be denied in good faith.
But determining that wasn’t the US Supreme Court’s jurisdiction. The 5 knew only that Bush was in danger of losing and couldn’t accept that risk. There’s no real rebuttal available to that. Yes, Rehnquist was willing to undermine democracy itself for partisan reasons, excusing it only by concurring that “Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances”.
Mercy me. A court ordering that the law be followed. Must have been a display of pure partisanship, of course. :rolleyes:
You still don’t get it. The definition is the province of the Florida legal system, not some anonymous yammerer on a message board. It doesn’t matter what you or I would come up with. The FSC had that job, you agree they had that job, and yet you’re defending their being prevented from doing it - while accusing the *other * guys of partisanship? Ri-i-i-ght.
I won’t waste any more time trying to explain the importance of democracy to you, then. That was a very saddening thing to read, though.
I assume that if the Supreme Court found that the federal Equal Protection Clause required that every state recognize same-sex marriage, then you’d be in favor of such a finding; you wouldn’t say it was exceeding their jurisdiction. Right?
Why, then, can’t they say that counting ballots with different standards in different counties violates the federal Equal Protection Clause? What puts that out of their jurisdiction?
Of course they *can *, as in “they have the institutional power”, rule any damn thing they want to. Don’t be so silly. :rolleyes:
Please also don’t harbor the illusion that the ruling was based in actually honoring the principle EP rather than flouting it. That was partisan spin all along, in this case originating with the 5 themselves under the leadership of Rehnquist. Do you really think history will let him, and them, off the hook for that, or will it be politely ignored like the 1876 election already brought up? “Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances.”
I suppose I’m just one of those morons, then. Even though I followed politics and elections from teen-age. Even though I registered as soon as I was eligible and took pride in voting in the first election that I could. Even though I never miss voting in elections, even when the only items on the ballot are local issues or primaries.
I’m a freaking moron because I didn’t know that you have to completely remove the chad in order for the vote to count or they’ll throw the damn thing out. Well, I’m no expert in computerised punch card readers. Silly me for not knowing that an election worker can’t fix a hanging chad. Heck, I didn’t even know what a “hanging chad” was. You know what, no one ever told me any of this stuff. So, now I have to live with the fact that I don’t know how many of my votes since 1987 have actually been counted. First it’s the punch cards and now it’s the freaking no-paper-trail touch screens.
Democracy. Woo hoo.
It’s easy to sit back and call it a clusterfuck and act like it’s all out of our hands. But things seem pretty simple to me. Use hand-marked, hand-counted paper ballots. Have an election worker check each ballot to make sure that all the marks are made clearly. Give people a chance to do it over if it’s unclear. Use indelible ink to make sure people don’t vote more than once (we were showing it off in Iraq, remember?). Keep ballots in the public eye at all times and make a rule saying that no ballot may be left uncounted. Once the election is over, allow anyone who wants to to recount the ballots as many times as they want.
Will there be some problems? Yeah, there’ll be some. But confidence in the integrity of our electoral system would be considerably higher than it is now with the apologists pretending that “wow, in this day and age, there’s just no way to fix things.”
The Fla SC had a chance to set a standard, but they chose not to, so don’t preach to me about being “prevented” from doing anything. If they had wanted to standardize the definition of a legal vote, they had ample opportunity to do so. And Fla SC did not order that the law be followed. They changed the certification deadline in violation of state statute and over the USSC over-ruling. They eliminated that standard of a legal vote that Kathleen Harris set up though legally she was the ultimate arbiter of the legitimacy of votes under Florida State Statute. You can argue all you want for the FSC holding-out against Republican tyranny that you want, but acknowledge that they had to change Florida law to do it.
As I said in an earlier post, thing like hanging chads, off-center circles, overvotes, etc. is not what I was referring to. I don’t know about your precients, but the ones in Los Angeles County had huge warning on the ballot and in the booth to check and remove the chads completely.
If you thought I was referring to you (albeit indirectly) I apoligize. I was referring to the concept of a dimpled chad, a faint line on a ballot, or some such mark that is probably an error but counts as a vote. You know, I’ve probably have made dimpled chads by placing my stylus in the hole, double-checking the name, and realized it was in the wrong hole.
If a person truly meant to vote for the person, then it is moronic not to get the chad to separate in two places on the ballot (I’ll even grant one place). I think that people would rather believe in this reality than the alternative - in close elections, election boards are manufacturing votes when there is no true intent by claiming dimpled chads are votes.
I agree 100%. That’s why I favor the electronic machines (with paper ballot backup). If you didn’t vote for an office, it tells you and you have to chose not to vote. It gives you a summary of how you voted before you commit, and if you make a mistake, you can correct it without getting a poll worker. The cluster-fuck I was referring to was the court involvement. Most of the time, democracy works and whether you left a hanging chad or I made a dimpled chad ain’t gonna change the election. But whether you agree with me that the Florida Supreme Court screwed up or with Elvislives that the US Supreme Court screwed up, at least one (or maybe both) made a mockery of the 2000 vote.
Washington in 2004 - King County gets to violate state law in regards to recounts buit no other county is. Democrats and Republicans are allowed to hunt up their respective registered voters to see if they sent in an uncounted absentee ballot instead of impartial election board members. Four Republicans testify as to improprieties at a polling site in a heavily Democratic area that allowed them to vote illegally with the result that their 4 votes were thrown ount and the rest of the vote certified with no further investigation. I think Gregoire did win fairly and that King County was more incompetent than corrupt, but with a final victory margin of 133 votes, the courts couldn’t do a better job than that?
Once again I’ll say that there need to be in place a priori clear standards as to what constitutes a legal vote. Hanging chads? Legal; Only 1 corner separated? No vote, Overvote? legal; etc. with the stipulation that it is agreed to by the Sec’y of State, County election boards, and the State Supreme Court that the standard agreed to is the only measure of the “intent of the voter”.
In order to reach the conclusion that he did in Bush v. Gore, Rehnquist had to do a 180 degree turn from his usual position on states’ rights. Why did he do this? Because it was a Republican vs. a Democrat and Rehnquist ALWAYS sides with Republicans against Democrats. The man was a partisan hack. Because of him, a reasonable man must now conclude, 'The Supreme Court of the United States is corrupt, led by apartisan hack, whose death is a happy day for the Court and for thinking people everywhere."
And of course, all the evidence, particularly that damning memo on the Plessy case, points to his having been a racist bigot as well. We are well shed of such trash.
Cite?
You need to review what the deadline actually was.
Only if she followed the law, and she patently did not. The courts’ purpose, well, one of their purposes, is to make sure the executive follows the law.
You can stick to your precious GOP talking point list all you want, but you can’t turn spin into fact.
Originally Posted by SaintCad
The Fla SC had a chance to set a standard, but they chose not to, so don’t preach to me about being “prevented” from doing anything.
The Florida SC decision on remand in Gore v Harris. The concurring opinions are quite interesting and do a good job analyzing many of the problems associated with the recounts including Miami-Dade’s indecision in starting a recount based on the statistical data from the test precients.
What law did she violate? Section 106.166? Even the FSC agreed with Harris in Palm Beach County Canvassing Board v Harris. that the statute covered properly working voting machines not counting properly marked ballots. This then would not apply to the infamoud “dimpled chad”. She (as the chief election officer in the state) decided that to protect Florida’s interest to use the safe harbor provision of 3 USC 5. After this there would be a possibility of Federal interference in the determination of the vote a la Hayes-Tilden 1876.
The law specifies that a legal vote is a one that shows the “clear intent of the voter”, but how clear that intent be if a canvassing board can’t agree to a standard among themselves? Harris set a standard that clear intent is indicated on an undervote if the vote is “properly executed in accordance with the instructions provided to all registered voters in advance of the election and in the polling places.” There may be an argument made that this was overly restrictive, but it was the only consistant standard given by any state, county, or judicial officer.
Although you choose to ignore the facts:
- During the recount, there were problems with interpreting the ambiguous statement “clear intent of the voter”.
- The Sec’y of State as the officer in charge of the election give a standard interpretation that is clear and unambiguous.
- The Florida Supreme Court threw out that standard as unnecessarily (and probably unconstitutionally) restrictive but refuses to replace it with a new standard.
- Bush raises concerns that the standard used at the county level are inconsistently applied county by county and even within the same county.
- The US Supreme Court rules that inconsistent standards violate the Equal Protection Clause.
As for the timeline, you are correct that the true deadline is 1pm EST on 6 January 2001 (3 USC 15), but there was the very real possibility that at that time there would be two sets of electors sent (one for Bush from Harris and one for Gore for Florida courts) at which time both houses of Congress would vote for the electors. The HoR would have voted for Bush electors and the Senate would have (probably) voted for the Gore electors. It would be 1876 all over again. By utilizing the safe harbor clause of 3 USC 5, all of this would be avoided. You choose to interpret Bush v Gore as Rehnquist giving the election to Bush. It could also be interpreted as Rehnquist trying to avoid a possible Constitutional crisis in January. Another interpretation is that the US Supreme Court decided that the ultimate arbiter of a legal vote is the Sec’y of State and not a court - especially if the Sec’y of State sets a standard and the court does not (admittedly this would be a stretch, but it is based on the ruling stopping the recount). I think that the decision is that of upholding state soverignty - namely that a Sec’y of State has the right to determine if sending in the list of electors under the deadline in 3 USC 5 is in the best interest of the state.
Yes, the court does have to give the executive a chance to do the job legally itself first.
Don’t mean crap.
The one requiring all ballots to be counted according to the clear intent of the voter.
Interference? No, a Constitutional role. Part of the spin you’ve swallowed whole is that that had to be avoided at all costs - part of rationalizing the Supreme Court’s “Federal interference”.
Excuses, excuses, all to disguise a lack of good faith by those who looked for reasons *not * to do their jobs. More rationalizing.
Snort. That’s a better-defined standard than “clear intent of the voter”? Be serious.
No, I’m exposing spin. Not the same thing at all.
Again, a drama, but *not * a crisis.
Translation: By footdragging long enough, the job of actually counting the votes and determining the winner under the process of democracy, the remedies provided under the rules of democracy could be made unavailable.
You need to reread his court’s injunction stopping the count. Is there any way to read it other than “Once we find a way to make Bush President, it’s gonna look real bad if it ever comes out that Gore won, so we’re gonna prevent that possibility”? Any way? Please. The outcome was obvious as soon as the 5 decided to hear the case.
If that’s what he meant, he was using the Court to override the process of democracy. That’s what I’ve said, and apparently you agree.
You can’t be serious.
Shut up.
You GAVE the Court that power.
The Court shouldn’t have the power to ignore the written law and substitute its own judgement. You gave them that power; you cheered when they used it.
Now you’re whining because your corrupt judges didn’t keep their corruption benefitting your side.
So…apparently whether Rehnquist was the worst Chief Justice in US history comes down to whether Bush v. Gore was decided correctly?
Eh.
Whether it was decided correctly or not, it seems to me that Bush would have ended up with the presidency. Given the botched election the republican-controlled state legislature would have ordered republican electors to show up. If a democratic slate also showed up in defiance of the state legislature, the republican-controlled house would have to vote over which slate of electors was official. Guess who would have won such a vote?
And anyway, we’ve had about 5379 threads about Bush v. Gore over the last 5 years. If you want to start another one, feel free. But do we really have to argue about it again here?
Blaming Rehnquist for putting Bush in office kind of misses the point. Was he the worst Chief Justice in American history? By what criteria? What makes a good chief justice, what makes a bad one? If a Chief Justice makes decisions you disagree with does that make him a bad Chief Justice? Would one bad decision (such as…say…Bush v. Gore) make him the worst Chief Justice even if his other decisions were OK?