For the past week, the Gore campaign has been saying that the Florida Supreme Court would be the final arbiter of this election. But now that they didn't get a decision exactly to their liking, the Gore campaign is backpedaling and saying that they will leave all their options open.
In response to inquiries about whether dimpled chads can be counted as votes, the Florida Supreme Court cited the Hartke case in Illinois, but the Illinois case didn't talk about dimpled chads at all. It involved hanging chads, the standard that these three counties began using and the standard that they are now seeking to change. o There has been a lot of talk about statutes in Texas governing manual recounts. In Texas this would all be over because Texas only allows one manual recount, and it has very clear and objective standards. The first of those is when you see light coming through, and the second of those is where you have a hanging chad. It's only in the third instance that the statute in Texas speaks about any consideration of a dimpled chad, and it doesn't say that a dimpled chad can be considered standing alone. It says it can be considered only where it also is accompanied by a clearly ascertainable intent of the voter to vote.
