Ethics and Politics in the Florida Presidential Vote Count                January 2001

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>The winner is . . . we should know by the time this column appears. In all of the hubris surrounding the presidential count in Florida, there has been little if any commentary about ethical issues. True, there has been much commentary about legal and illegal votes, deadlines, court rulings, voting machines, partisanship, and political posturing by both parties, but ethics? Nada.

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>Why? Perhaps the answer is that the true believers in the Gore camp know in their heart that he really won Florida and the presidency. Or, perhaps true believers in the Bush camp know that George W. won the machine count (more than once) and the constitution is clear about the role the electoral college plays in the selection of a president.  Consequently, the matter is nothing more or nothing less than a legal affair and that's why the lawyers moved to center stage.

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>But, consider the role of the Supervisor of Elections in Florida. Supervisors are elected countywide in a partisan election and their re-election is often uncontested. In the larger counties, the SOE receives a handsome salary that can reach six digits. The job is quite attractive financially even in the smaller counties. Most SOEs attempt to run their offices in a fair and even-handed manner but as the case in Seminole County demonstrated, this is not always the case. The SOE there, Sandra Goard, apparently allowed Republican party workers to use the SOE office to add information to absentee applications so the ballots, when returned,  would not be declared invalid while denying the same opportunity to Democrats. Foul cried the Democrats. In Martin County, the SOE allowed Republicans to take absentee ballot applications out of her office to add information to prevent ballots that are returned from being declared invalid. And, in Palm Beach County, the SOE created the infamous "butterfly" ballot that caused confusion and many voters allege, resulted in their casting a ballot for the wrong candidate.

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