-Caveat Lector-
November 22, 2000
Florida legislators say law would allow them to name electors
By Donald Lambro
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Florida legislators said yesterday they are considering
using a federal law that would let them name the state's 25
electors if the presidential election stalemate is not resolved
before the Dec. 12 deadline to certify them.
As the Republican-controlled Legislature was sworn in yesterday
in the midst of the legal and political turmoil that has gripped
the state since the Nov. 7 election, Republican leaders were
studying a 1948 federal statute that permits them to appoint a
slate of electors if one has not been chosen through the normal
elections process.
"What is under consideration is calling a special session,
appointing a set of electors prior to Dec. 12," said state Sen.
Locke Burt, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee with
jurisdiction over the issue.
Mr. Locke said Republican lawmakers were concerned that if
the dispute over who won the popular vote is not settled soon and
no electors are chosen by the deadline to cast their vote in the
Electoral College, it "will result in disenfranchising the 6
million people [in Florida] who did vote."
"I think the most important issue is that Florida's 25 votes
are cast at the Electoral College. We will make sure that that
happens," said Sen. John McKay.
But some election strategists feared that if the law is
used, it would be challenged in the courts and perhaps result in
Florida's electors being thrown out by the joint session of
Congress that will be held to count the Electoral College votes
on Jan. 6 and formally elect the next president.
The obscure statute has never been used or tested in the
courts and there are questions about whether a legislature can
supersede constitutional law, which gives the states' electorate
the right to choose the candidate whose electors are then
designated to vote for him.
But Florida House Speaker Tom Feeney has repeatedly
threatened to use that authority if the electoral deadline draws
near and the election dispute has not been settled.
"We're going to potentially ignore the state Supreme Court,"
Mr. Feeney said last week. "It is the state Legislature that
determines the method of selecting electors."
Mr. Feeney has since softened his position somewhat on using
the law, though his chief spokesman, Kim Stone, told The
Washington Times yesterday that "we have sought outside legal
advice to understand exactly what the law means."
"However, it's not something we are actively pursuing," she
said.
"But if someone comes to us when the deadline is near and
says this is what it comes down to, then we'd step up to the
plate," she said.
Angered by the way its authority over election law is being
challenged in a dozen or more lawsuits, the Legislature may be on
a collision course with the state's highest court. The justices
ruled against Secretary of State Katherine Harris last night,
requiring her to accept amended returns as late as Monday � 13
days past the Nov. 14 deadline established by Florida law.
In a strong show of support yesterday for her legal battle
in the courts, a joint session of the Legislature gave Mrs.
Harris a standing ovation.
After the state Supreme Court prevented Mrs. Harris from
declaring Mr. Bush the winner, as she had planned to do last
Saturday, Mr. Feeney issued a warning that raised the threat of
the Legislature acting on its own.
"It is my intention to monitor the discord between the
judicial and executive branches, and the Florida Legislature will
play a role should it become necessary," he said in a statement.
The key provision in the law that Mr. Feeney and his
colleagues may use says that when a state "has failed to make a
choice on the day prescribed by law, the electors may be
appointed on a subsequent day in such a manner as the legislature
of such state may direct."
Under one interpretation, the law would be triggered by
Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who would have to declare that the state
has been unable to choose its electors, thus forcing him to call
a special legislative session to name them.
If the Legislature's Republicans took this action, there is
no doubt that they would have the votes to name a slate of
electors committed to the Texas governor. Republicans have a
25-15 majority in the Senate and a 77-43 majority in the House.
But such action, if it comes, could ignite a major conflict
between the courts and the Legislature and, perhaps, with
Congress, said Norman Ornstein, a presidential elections analyst
at the American Enterprise Institute.
"The question becomes, if you do have electors selected
because the court rules this is the election result or issues
rules to find the intent of the voters, then is it appropriate
for the Legislature to step in and overrule that judgment by the
court?" Mr. Ornstein said.
"How you resolve that kind of dispute is an open question.
That one ends up in the U.S. Supreme Court and it could end up in
Congress. You could conceivably have two sets of electors coming
up here," he said.
But if one of the candidates ends up winning Florida's 25
electoral votes outright at the end of a long, disputed hand
count, that does not necessarily mean the end of Florida's
electoral problems.
House Republican Whip Tom DeLay is circulating a memo
reminding colleagues that it takes only two members, one from
each house, to object to an elector or slate of electors and a
majority vote to reject them.
Florida lawmakers yesterday were clearly concerned that
media coverage of the contested election might hurt the state's
image.
Mr. McKay urged creation of a bipartisan commission to
examine the Florida election laws that have been the focus of
legal challenges in the presidential election.
"That review must begin soon and must be conducted in a
nonpartisan manner that will ensure the highest level of public
confidence," the Republican state senator said.
In the House, Mr. Feeney told colleagues, "We have an
opportunity to lead this great state forward and show the world
that we are not the state currently being portrayed on the
evening news."
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Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT
FROM THE DESK OF:
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