Includes bibliographical references and index. Editors' Preface -- Preface : The Case That Must Be Named -- A Vote Too Close to Call -- Enter the Lawyers -- Eye of the Beholder -- The Battlefield of Litigation -- The Ticking of the Clock -- Ballots before the Bench -- "A Florida Hurricane Heading to Washington" -- Headfirst into the Political Thicket -- A Self-Inflicted Wound? -- The Unlearned Lessons of -- Afterword : The Process Matters -- Postscript : Lessons Still Unlearned -- Chronology : A Time Line of Events for the 2000 Presidential Postelection Crisis -- Bibliographic Essay
Summary:
"Twenty years later, the Supreme Court's controversial 5-4 decision in Bush v. Gore has gained a new relevance. While we no longer talk about hanging chads and butterfly ballots, the story of endless recounts, raucous allegations, and constitutional crises seems more pertinent than ever in the wake of 2016. If President Obama's resounding victory in 2008 gave the nation a false sense of security, the hotly contested state and national elections in 2016 revealed that the country's political institutions had not learned the lessons of 2000-or had learned the wrong lessons. This updated second edition of Charles Zelden's acclaimed account of Bush v. Gore adds a new chapter on the voting wars that have raged in the twenty years since the Supreme Court's decision to allow George W. Bush to become the 43rd President of the United States, despite losing the popular vote to Al Gore. Zelden chronicles the aggressive efforts to manipulate elections by imposing strict voter ID requirements, purging voter rolls, requiring proof of citizenship, undermining third-party voter registration drives, limiting access to polling sites, restricting early voting, and gerrymandering districts-with Republicans on offense and Democrats on defense. The result has been the revelation that the United States is one close election away from a repeat of 2000, but with far less faith in the American electoral process than was the case then. The election controversy of 2000 signaled major flaws in our electoral system that remain with us today"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.