...Val Collins US Gov Period 2 3/20/2018 Presidential Election of 2000 The presidential election that took place between George W. Bush and Al Gore was not legitimate. The recount that was stopped by the supreme court may have ended with Gore with the most votes. The latest figures that were published on December 21,2000 recalled that Gore had 50,996,064 votes, while George W. Bush had 50,456,167 votes. The number of votes were very close to each other. Bush had lost the vote by 539,897 which would have been close to the amount of people who would have voted...
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...In the film, Recount, the 2000 election was not legitimate between Governor of Texas, George W. Bush and the U.S Vice President Al Gore. At the end of the voting day on November 7th, 1999 Bush had 2,909 votes and Gore had 2,709, resulting in a difference of 1,784 votes. According to the movie, when there are less than 0.3% of votes between both candidates, this caused the machine to do an automatic recount. Due to the machine recount of votes, it caused one party to do a hand recount and the other party to disagree on this. During their disagreement, they were arguing whether or not the counties should count dimpled chads; this meant that not all of the votes were being counted by all of the counties. In addition, because of their disagreement,...
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...Absentee ballots played a large part in the debacle of the 2000 election. By Florida law, overseas absentee ballots could be counted until November 17. Overseas absentee ballots often come from wealthy Americans living abroad, or from members of the military. At midnight, the deadline passed for receipt of overseas absentee ballots. There were an estimated 2,300 of these ballots for Florida (over 25,000 overall), which were expected to have an impact on the final results. After counting the overseas absentee ballots, Bush's lead over Gore increased to 930 votes in Florida. Bush picked up 1,380 of them and Gore received 750 votes. Democrats sued Seminole County Canvassing Board for including certain absentee ballots in the vote totals that did not satisfy the legal requirement that the person requesting the absentee ballot provide the elector's registration number on their application. Although the Democrats could make a valid legal argument for challenging these ballots (and thereby likely stopping Bush from padding his vote lead), this move left the impression among many that Al Gore was a hypocrite. The Bush team dropped its lawsuit intended to force Florida counties to reconsider overseas military ballots that were rejected for technical reasons. Presumably, they wanted to avoid criticisms of hypocrisy similar to those made against Al Gore. On November 27th, Another lawsuit arose. Apparently, Republican volunteers in Seminole County corrected mistakes made by...
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...Professor Class Due date Background The year 2000 election was the most closely contested of all presidential elections in the United States. The election involved strong candidates George Bush and Al Gore of Republican and Democratic parties respectively. The closeness of the race gave rise to an election petition challenging the election of George Bush as president. At the epicenter of the crisis was the state of Florida where the democrats complained of election malpractices that was aimed at favoring the Republican candidate. The conflict heightened and the Florida Supreme Court took the matter as required by the legislative laws of the state. The court argued that the democrats had enough reasons to warrant a recount of votes. The reasons for the recount, as stated by the democrats were that the Republicans worked with the state governor to deny Democratic Party followers a chance to vote. According to the court, the agents at certain precincts did not allow some ethnic minorities to vote or required too many documents such as passports against the elections laws of the state of Florida. In addition, the case was argued that some of the officials left the polling stations early leaving out some voters. Upon hearing the complaints from all parties, the Florida Supreme court ordered afresh recount of votes all over the state of Florida by a 4-3 vote. Consequently, multiple court proceedings arose on the same issue of elections. He US supreme court took over the matter and...
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...The 2000 presidential election was contested by the U.S. Vice President Al Gore (D) and Texas Governor George W. Bush (R). On the evening of November 7, 2000 there was no clear winner in the Presidential Election. It was evident around the time the results were being calculated that the vote would be extremely close. In fact, the results from the state of Florida were believed to determine the overall winner of the election. There were less than 600 votes that were to establish the winner. When the votes were cast and counted, George W. Bush was declared the winner. However, there were reports of many issues with the ballots in Florida which led to many questions regarding the validity of the outcome. It was clear that Gore won the popular...
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...Imagine trying to light a fire underwater. Despite your greatest efforts, there is something present that was always holding you back. That’s how the US government was after the 1796 presidential elections. The previous president, George Washington, was tired of the heavy criticisms and stress he received while in office, he yearned to return to his home, Mount Vernon. He decided he would not consider a third term. Although he felt it was disreputable to support any candidate, he did support his vice president, John Adams. The general consensus among leading Federalists was that Massachusetts’ John Adams would follow George Washington. However, Alexander Hamilton had arguments with Adams so he tried to influence the results of the election by persuading many Southern electors to vote for South Carolina’s Thomas Pinckney, whom was believed to be the best vice presidential candidate, to spite Adams. It wasn’t that Hamilton liked Pinckney, but rather because he hated Pinckney less. However, word leaked out, and in retaliation, Adams supporters in New England persuaded electors to drop Thomas Pinckney's name from their ballots....
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...1. List two reasons why Hamilton felt a small number of persons would be better suited to choose the President of the United States. The first purpose was to create a buffer between population and the selection of a President. He and other founding fathers were afraid of direct election to the Presidency. He feared a tyrant could manipulate public opinion and come to power; basically the common men were not smart enough to make a correct selection or a select few elite “most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station.” The second reason; as part of the structure of the government that gave extra power to the smaller states. The Electoral College is also part of compromises made at the convention to satisfy the small states. The slave holding states did not want a direct election for president because slaves were not counted as population until 1783 then at only 5/8 of a person. A direct election for president did not sit well with most delegates from the slave states, which had large populations but far fewer eligible voters. Under the system of the Electoral College each state had the same number of electoral votes as they have representative in Congress, thus no state could have less then 3...
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...majority winner must receive 270 votes to be elected. With a few minor exceptions, the Electoral College gives all of the electoral votes for each state to the plurality winner in that state, regardless of the margin of victory. This "winner takes all" arrangement at the state level can elect a President who loses the popular vote, as was the case in 1824, 1876, 1888, and 2000. Firstly, one reason supporting the abolishment of the EC is that it suppresses the popular will. This is because it may allow a candidate to win despite only receiving a minority of votes across the country as a whole. For example, in the 2000 elections Gore received approximately 500,000 more of the popular vote than Bush winning in most major cities and urban counties. However, Bush received more electoral votes throughout the rest of the nation winning more than three times the amount of counties than Gore. It also suppresses the popular will through faithless electors. These are members of the House of Representatives who were chosen to vote for a party but do not vote for their state’s preferred candidate. For example, in the 2000 election, Barbara Simmons abstained voting for Al Gore to protest the lack of congressional representation in Washington DC. This led to millions of voters not being fairly represented. Secondly, the EC leads to some votes counting more than others. This is because the number of electors allocated to each state is based on each state’s representation in Congress. Every state...
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...Change Toward Two-Round Voting The controversial 2000 election in America was an eye-opener for change in our electoral system. The third party with similarities to the Democrats had stolen votes from the two bigger parties running for presidency, therefore the Republicans won. Implementing two-round voting will eliminate the problem of third parties captivating votes away from larger parties. Although, this electoral system may take longer, two-round voting is vital to put into action for it will select the best candidate for America. To a large number of Americans this may be a new concept, but is not new in the political world. According to Roberts, a political thinker, the first record of this system being employed is 1871-1918, practiced in the German empire and in New Zealand in 1908 and 1911 elections. The two-round system functions as, if no one wins 50 percent of the votes in the first round, all candidates, except the top two are dropped and voters vote a second time. In the second round, the candidate who wins the most votes is elected. By virtue of only the top two candidates moving on to the second round, the only way a candidate can win is by a majority vote; this electoral system is the most adequate way to have a country’s majority appoint a candidate. Two-round system is a further democratic way of voting considering only the popular-majority vote wins, without representatives choosing for the people. This provides smaller parties an opportunity to receive...
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...Comparatively to other countries, it is much more convenient for them to vote because all of their registrations are automatic. It is the individuals choice to register and they are assuming that responsibility. Patterson also mentions how “today, 87 percent live in states that shut down registration two or more weeks before Election Day.” By closing the registration two weeks before Election Day, we are being limited. By having the registration open till Election Day established in all states, we can see an increase on the voting because it is being considerate to the people. And by giving us more of an education of the political system, we can rise the percentage of votes united and by communicating with others either in school, churches or organizations, we can form political opinions about the candidate and become more intrigued with the election (Patterson...
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...results are truly accurate or a miscalculation. The best way to solve this problem is to no longer use any by optical scanners, punch cards, or touch screens and make voting possible online. Internet voting seems like the most logical answer to the current problems faced by these machines and punch cards. It is also possible to have internet voting while ensuring that the votes are accurate. New voting technologies tend to emerge out of crises of confidence as seen prominently in the 2000 presidential election. We only rarely change systems and in response to a public anxiety that electoral results can no longer be trusted. There have been many incidents where previous voting machines have failed and made the results untrustworthy. A perfect example of one major incident is the 2000 presidential election in Florida. During that election year the votes from Florida were “too close to call” and had to be counted once and recounted again after that. Recounts could easily be required for elections where optical scanners or...
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...Democrat in Texas. Texas has been a Republican state for the past 20 years, by the popular vote. Additionally, if you are a Republican in Maryland, because Maryland is predominantly a Democratic state, your vote would not matter in the majority of elections. Be it resolved that the United States presidential election be decided by the electoral college. (Pause…) We support this resolution on these four contentions. First, rural areas are constantly ignored by the electoral college and secondly, the electoral college fails to represent the national will. Also, the distribution of the electoral college votes per state is not equally dispersed. (Pause…) Lastly, the electoral college depresses the voter turnout. Be it. Resolved that the general population determines who wins the national election, not the electoral college. (Pause…)...
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...CHAPTER 2 FOREIGN LITERATURE “Electronic Voting Literature” Voting on the internet using PC's everyday offers only weak security, but its main disadvantages are in the areas of anonymity and protection against coercion and/or vote selling. The Presidential elections of 2000 brought national attention to problems with current American methods of casting and counting votes in public elections. Most people believe that the current system should be changed; there is much disagreement on how such changes should be made. Dr. Michael Shamos of CMU provides a sharp counterpoint [6] to Neumann and Mercuri's views. While his “Six Commandments” summary of requirements for a voting system is very similar to others' requirements, he's less afraid of the catastrophic failures and sweeping fraud made possible by imperfections in electronic voting machines actually occurring in a real election. Shamos is also much less impressed with paper ballots than are Neumann and Mercuri. He places a great deal of faith in decentralization to make fraud difficult to commit and easy to detect. Dr. Shamos even likes DRE machines. (We must take into account the fact that this paper was written ten years ago, long before the 2000 elections and before more modern mathematical results like Chaum's; some of Dr. Shamos' opinions may have changed since then. While Dr. Neumann's talk cited here is of similar age, his pessimism with regard to machines has had little reason for change.) Rebecca Mercuri invented...
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...The electoral college is the representative body that elects the President of the United States every four years. The electoral college is comprised of 538 electors, and a majority of 270 votes is needed for a presidential nominee to become the next president. The size of the electoral college is figured by adding the number of senators and the number of representatives; furthermore, the same formula can be used to figure out the number of electors per state. The electoral college was created by the Constitution, but that doesn’t stop people from questioning if it should stay or be discarded in favor of simply a popular vote. The electors are non-federal officials that are usually elected in early November every four years( corresponding...
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...founding fathers in the Constitution. It is a compromise between election of the President by a vote in Congress and election of the President by a popular vote of qualified citizens. The process of the Electoral College consists of the selection of the electors, the meeting of the electors where they vote for the President and the Vice President, and the counting of the electoral votes by Congress. The Electoral College has 538 electors, with a majority of 270 electoral votes required to elect the President. Each candidate running for President in your state has their own electors. The electors are generally chosen by the candidate’s...
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