U.S. Supreme Court Issues Election Ruling

Well, the United States Supreme Court has given their "ruling" concerning the Florida Supreme Court. They've asked for more information fromthe Florida Supreme Court. Update: 12/04 06:01 PM by H : You can read the the actual ruling as well. Update: 12/04 07:59 PM by H :Thanks to Mr. Sturkel for this much better analysis: "In today's posting of the Supreme Court ruling on the Florida ballot case you state that the Supreme Court over turned the Florida State Supreme Court case on manual recounts; this is incorrect. The High Court "set aside" the case, not over turned it which is two different things. In setting aside the case the Supreme Court asked the Florida Supreme Court to re-examine the case and to explain and clarify further the basis of their ruling, In a nutshell, The Supreme Court wants to know why the Florida Supreme Court did what they did before issuing a final ruling on the case."

Comments

Premature Headline?

[GrievousAngel]

They didn't really overturn it; they sent it back to the Florida state Supreme Court to reconsider.

Re:Premature Headline?

[Janthkin]

This is interesting, too:
From the opinion:
"This is sufficient reason for us to decline at this time to review the federal questions asserted to be present
(Emphasis added.)

What's this mean? Well, the US SC wasn't sure exactly where the Fl SC got its ruling from, and so redirected it to /dev/null before requerrying, looking for more substantive output. If such output is forthcoming, they still have reserved the right to deal with this further. :)

Re:He's done- no matter what the outcome.

[startled]

*yawn* Let me guess-- you voted Republican.

If you've been following the opinion polls on all this, everything is sharply divided. About half the country thinks the Republicans are a bunch of crafty, evil, election stealers. The other half of the country thinks the Democrats are a bunch of crafty, evil, election stealers. Each side comes up with a lot of boring, self-righteous rhetoric. The truth is, each side is trying their damnedest to win the election, ideals be damned. The Democrats say "every vote should be heard", and then fight to get military ballots invalidated. The Republicans say, "this should be decided by the people, not the courts", and then are the first to file a lawsuit.

The truth is, both candidates are going to come out of this looking bad, and low on support. They're both going to have trouble with re-election.

The Supreme Court of the U.S. managed to stay out of the entire shitstorm by not making a decisive decision about how the election results should be treated. They may catch some crap for that, but most people are quite happy that they have some enough respect for state's rights to stay out of it.

Re:Wrong

[David Hume]

The Bush campaign did not ask for the decision to be overturned, they specifically asked for it to be set aside. The Supreme Court decided in favor of Bush, so as requested the Florida decision was set aside.

I don't want to be rude, but you are simply wrong regarding the effect of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision.

The U.S. Supreme Court's slip opinion, which I posted below, does not reverse the opinion of the Florida Supreme Court, it instead vacates and remands the decision in order to obtain clarification. The U.S. Supreme Court specifically states:

It is fundamental that state courts be left free and unfettered by us in interpreting their state constitutions. But it is equally important that ambiguous or obscure adjudications by state courts do not stand as barriers to a determination by this Court of the validity under the federal constitution of state action. Intelligent exercise of our appellate powers compels us to ask for the elimination of the obscurities and ambiguities from the opinions in such cases." Id., at 557.

Specifically, we are unclear as to the extent to which the Florida Supreme Court saw the Florida Constitution as circumscribing the legislature' s authority under Art. II, 1, cl. 2. We are also unclear as to the consideration the Florida Supreme Court accorded to 3 U. S. C. 5. The judgment of the Supreme Court of Florida is therefore vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

Thus, even this specific matter is far from over. The Florida Supreme Court could clarify its decision, make it clear that it knows that the Florida Constitution does not circumscribe the legislature' s authority under Art. II, 1, cl. 2 of the U.S. Constitution, and reach the same result. The U.S. Supreme Court could then review the new decision by the Florida Supreme Court.

Don't blame me...

[vex24]

Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!

PER CURIAM

[smarner]

IAAL, but more importantly, I can read. 95% of the slashdotters who have posted on this subject have obviously not even bothered to read the short order issued by the Supreme Court (7 pages). (Of course, based on the teaser for this story, it doesn't look like Hemos read it either.) 1. The order was issued "PER CURIAM" which means "by the court." Black's Law Dictionary defines "PER CURIAM" further: A phrase used to distinguish an opinion of the whole court from an opinion written by any one judge. Sometimes it denotes an opinion written by the chief justice or presiding judge, or to a brief announcement of the disposition of a case by court not accompanied by a written opinion. 2. Although the Supreme Court remanded (sent back) the decision to the Florida Supreme Court, it made clear that the Florida Supreme Court could NOT rely upon some of the grounds cited in the opinion - - like the right of suffrage the Florida Supreme Court found in the Flordia Constitution. But it remains possible that the Florida Supreme Court could write (although it probably couldn't do it with a straight face), that it was merely interpreting conflicting state statutory provisions, and that as a matter of statutory interpretation it determined that the deadline was flexible, etc. Why hasn't anyone in the media bothered to point out how ridiculous some of the logic in the Florida Supreme Court decision was? The court found a conflict in two provisions: one that said the Secretary of State SHALL disregard late ballots, and another saying the she MAY disregard such ballots. How can anyone rationally say that the way to resolve this supposed conflict is to combine "MAY" and "SHALL" into "CANNOT!??"

Inaccuracy

[Logic Bomb]

Damnit Hemos...to be perfectly honest, political coverage on /. is horrid. Anytime a post-election item has been put on the main page, it's always accompanied by a totally uninformed blanket statement like "Bush is the winner." It's STILL not over -- to be precise, the Supreme Court decision was that the justices were not convinced that the Florida Supreme Court could rely on the Florida State Constitution for what they did, and said the Florida court needed to find a different way to justify its decision, like statutory clarification. One possible (and likely) scenario is that the Florida Supreme Court will look for a way to rewrite its opinion, probably just by removing any references to the state constitution so that it is merely deciding a conflict between two seemingly contradictory laws. This is beside the fact that simply reversing the Florida Supreme Court's decision does not end the election anyway because there are proceedings in other courts that remain uneffected.

Anyway, PLEASE don't attempt to be a political reporter! It can be very misleading if you don't know all the details. Just link to an AP story or something and let it be.

Re:He's done- no matter what the outcome.

[Xerithane]

The only way a country can be divided this badly, is if the only options are equally stupid.

Hemos, get real!

[Zak3056]

Well, the United States Supreme Court has issued their unanimous ruling. They've ruled against the Florida Supreme Court, meaning that Bush is the winner. What's interesting here is that inadverently, GWB's case has transferred a significant amount of power from the States to the Federal Government.

I know it's en vogue on slashdot not to actually READ the linked story before commenting, but I'd have hoped the slashdot staff was above that. Apparently not. All this opinion says is, in essence, "We don't know why you did what you did. Please explain." This is HARDLY a "transfer of power" from the states to the Federal government.

Both are hypocrites when it comes to states rights

[scotay]

"What's interesting here is that inadverently, GWB's case has transferred a significant amount of power from the States to the Federal Government."

Democrats are all for the federal government stomping over states rights to impose the federal nanny state. Only when they want their man in the White House, to they find that old time states rights religion.

Republicans are all for states rights when it comes to gun laws and restricting abortions. When your state decides to decriminalize medical marijuana or physician-assisted suicide, the Republicans come out of the woodwork to impose the power of the federal government on these uppity states.

Just goes to show that both major parties are inconsistent and hypocritical when it comes to states rights. The one good thing that can come of the mess is a new resurgence in third-party voters. This Libertarian doesn't have much hope, but there can't be a clearer example that the major parties stand for nothing. There is no principle that they will let get in the way of their victory.

Please correct the many errors

[The Cunctator]

Here's the ruling. (The decision is in the last few lines.)

First off, I think you put this in the wrong category--I'm pretty sure this isn't an Internet issue. (Okay, I see you fixed that while I wrote this. Good.)

Second, the Supreme Court did not overturn the Florida Supreme Court. They remanded the decision. The proper headline is "SCOTUS Sends Case Back to SCOF" (since /. should be using wonkish acronyms, don't you think?)

Third, as others have pointed out, it wasn't a "unanimous ruling", it was an unsigned ruling.

Fourth, "meaning that Bush is the winner" is misleading and vague, particularly since it doesn't say what he is the winner of. And he didn't really win anything, except more PR fodder.

Fifth, you should present some justification for your conclusion about the transference of power; I expect you can't, particularly since the news about this decision is vague and incomplete. Even if SCOTUS had ruled against the Florida Supreme Court, that wouldn't have transferred power away from the states to the federal govt., it would have transferred power away from the people and the courts to the legislative and executive branches.

However, I want to say that I don't particularly blame CmdrTaco for being so misleading, since the coverage has been confused--as the story first came out on the Net, the one-line reports were changing. General media coverage has been confusing, but they're starting to fix their sites and get the story right--I hope CmdrTaco will correct his post as well.

Finally, I want to say that I am very thankful that CmdrTaco posted this, because for anyone who cares about the long-term health of the republic and believes in the ideals of democracy this election is of utmost concern.

So, thank you, but get your facts straight.