[deport]

Exerpts from court decision in California recall		Monday, September 15, 2003
(09-15) 19:09 PDT (AP) -- Here are excerpts from Monday's decision by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which blocked California's Oct. 7 recall vote: * "The origins of the present controversy date to the aftermath of the 2000 presidential election, when national attention was drawn to the eccentricities of voting by pre-scored punch cards." * "In this case, Plaintiffs allege that the fundamental right to have votes counted in the special recall election is infringed because the pre-scored punchcard voting systems used in some California counties are intractably afflicted with technologic dyscalculia ... The effect is not trivial." * "Using error-prone voting equipment in some counties, but not in others will result in votes being counted differently among the counties." * "It is virtually undisputed that ... punch-card voting systems are significantly more prone to errors that result in a voter's ballot not being counted than the other voting systems used in California." * "In Bush (v. Gore), the Supreme Court held that using different standards for counting votes in different counties across Florida violated the Equal Protection Clause." * "The district court assumed that the Plaintiffs would suffer irreparable injury, but concluded that the Plaintiffs were not likely to prevail on the merits. It also concluded that the balance of hardships and consideration of the public interest weighed heavily in favor of allowing the special election to proceed ... We respectfully disagree and conclude that the district court erred in its legal analysis." * "The inherent defects in the system are such that approximately 40,000 voters who travel to the polls and cast their ballot will not have their vote counted at all." * "In sum, in assessing the public interest, the balance falls heavily in favor of postponing the election for a few months." * "The choice between holding a hurried, constitutionally infirm election and one held a short time later that assures voters that the 'rudimentary requirements of equal treatment and fundamental fairness are satisfied' is clear." * "These issues are better resolved prophylactically than by bitter, postelection litigation over the legitimacy of the election, particularly where the margin of voting machine error may well exceed the margin of victory."

[Scenic Sounds]

Thanks, deport.

Insomniacs can download the sixty plus page opinion here. ;-)

[Torie]

SCOTUS did NOT rule that there was an equal protection problem with different counties using different types of voting equipment. They ruled that not having a uniform standard for counting ballots once cast (hanging chad, dimpled chad, etc) violated equal protection. The 9th circuit is mischaracterizing the SCOTUS opinion. Some would say they are lying.

[Torie]

I might add that a lot of states have different kinds of equipment between counties. There are lots of equal protection denying elections going on before are very eyes, per the 9th circuit rationale.

[goldstategop]

Bunk. Bush only held a standardless situation of counting votes in one county differently from votes in another county, posed an Equal Protection issue. It never said different voting methods ever posed a problem. The Nine Circus simply misread Bush to set aside an election they didn't agree with. Its pushing Bush a lot further than the SCOTUS intended to take it. Under the Nine Circus holding, due to their novel argument that the absence of uniform voting methods within a state is unconstitutional, you've just invalidated every election ever held in our nation's history and in fact - you can never hold a fair election at all since their perfect standard is impossible in practice to meet. Its very clever as is their arrogating to themselves the role of running a STATE election, something our federal system forbids. For what its worth, the California Supreme Court saw NO constitutional problems with holding this recall election, as did TWO Federal District trial courts. The SCOTUS should bitch-slap these Clowns down.