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Lawyers for Gore Asks Court to Set Standards for Recount
Lawyers for US Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore on November 19 asked the Florida Supreme Court to set standards for "determining the voter' s intent" during the recounting of ballots.
The lawyers made the request in a filing to the court in reply to the written arguments of Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush explaining why Republicans want the court to stop hand recounts from being included in Florida's final tally.
Gore's lawyers argued that previous state court rulings have established the rules for discerning the will of the voter in close elections.
"For more than 80 years it has been settled Florida law that a ballot must be counted if the voter's intent is apparent from an examination of the ballot," they wrote.
The issue only becomes essential if the Florida court allows hand counts in three South Florida counties to continue at all.
Earlier on Sunday, Bush's legal team asked the state's Supreme Court to stop the ongoing hand recounts in the three counties and to uphold the statutory November 14 deadline for counties to report their results.
"It would be highly inequitable to keep the state and the nation on hold to finish a manual recount when the responsible officials failed expeditiously even to begin the process," Bush's lawyers wrote.
Oral arguments from both sides will be heard in Tallahassee, capital of Florida, at a crucial hearing on Monday afternoon.
The seven justices of the Florida Supreme Court will decide whether the hand recounts should continue in the three South Florida counties and their results be included in the state's final tally.
Florida's Secretary of State Katherine Harris announced that she would reject any manual recounts results, but the state Supreme Court ruled on Friday that she cannot certify election results until it holds a hearing on Monday afternoon.
Bush and Gore are fighting for the 25 electoral votes of Florida, which will decide the outcome of the U.S. presidential election.
Gore, who trailed Bush by 930 votes in Florida after the state' s official but uncertified count was announced on Saturday, hopes that the hand recounts will overtake Bush's lead.
Hand recounts continued over the weekend in Palm Beach and Broward counties. Miami-Dade County is scheduled to begin hand recounting on Monday and continue until December 1.
Local press reports said with 316 of the 609 precincts counted in Broward by midday on November 19, Gore had gained 88 votes.
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