And what happens if there is another decision to be made similar to the Florida 2000 vote, that in the end was decided by SCOTUS.

Uhhh... No.

SCOTUS did not decide the Florida 2000 vote... The Constitution did.

Article. II.

Section. 1.

The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows

Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.

http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_transcript.html

The Constitution plainly gives the State Legislatures the power to appoint Electors. There is not even a Constitutional requirement that a General Election for President be held in any given State. The People do NOT elect the President. The State Legislatures do. Any General Election for President held in Any State is merely custom.

No court of law in the USA has ANY jurisdiction to override this power given by the Constitution DIRECTLY to the State Legislatures.

SCOTUS correctly stayed out of it.

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

Therefore SCOTUS did have a part in the Florida 2000 election, even if they made no direct decision on who won.

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

R.I.P.

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rOZZ
Music
Pictures

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

But they were recounted and those totals were published!

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

And that's a good thing.

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SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

But they were recounted and those totals were published!

Where?

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

And that's a good thing.

Why?

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

Therefore SCOTUS did have a part in the Florida 2000 election, even if they made no direct decision on who won.

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

You still do not understand (along with a great many other people).

First, there is NO nationwide popular vote for President. The phrase 'popular vote' is totally without meaning in a national context. The People, Constitutionally, do not elect the President. The State Legislatures do.

Changing that would require a Constitutional Amendment be ratified, but since the only method of Amendment that has ever been used requires that the State Legislatures approve it, good luck getting it done.


On to the case at hand...


https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-949.ZPC.html

This is a multi-part, complicated case, that much is true. But, in the end SCOTUS did not decide the case, the US Constitution did.

Essentially, it was a 3-part decision.

Part 1: The Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment.

Part 2: The remedy for the decision in part 1.

Part 3: The Florida State Supreme Court violated Article II Section 1 of the US Constitution due to its interference in the affair.

Ok, the margin of victory for Bush in the Florida 2000 election was less than 0.5%, thus triggering an automatic machine recount which Bush also won, though by a lesser margin. Here is where Gore screwed the pooch.

If Gore had requested, possibly with the assistance of a lower court order, an immediate statewide recount of the ballots all under the same standard of what votes counted and what votes did not, he might have prevailed... not guaranteed, but the possibility existed. But he did not do so.

Instead, Gore requested that only some of the ballots in some of the precincts in some of the Counties in the State of Florida be manually recounted under varying standards of what counted and what didn't.

This was, in the eyes of the US Supreme Court, a clear violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.

7 of the 9 Supreme Court justices agreed (Kennedy, O'Connor, Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas, Breyer and Souter) that there was an Equal Protection violation.

I am going to have to gloss over the rest. I am ill, one of my kids is ill, and both of my parents are ill. My energy level is fading fast. I will post more later as time (and energy) permit.

On part 2, Breyer and Souter joined Ginsberg and Stevens in opposing the majority remedy, but essentially everyone was out of time to do anything about it.

Florida State law and US Federal law both required all challenges to the vote to be resolved by Dec. 12. The Florida vote had to be finally certified by end of day on Dec. 12th. Failure to do so would have sent the 2000 Presidential election to the US House of Representatives for decision (this HAS happened in the past, by the way), since neither candidate (Bush or Gore) had the required majority without the Florida electors.

And since the House had 223 R's, 211 D's, and one vacancy at that time, well.... It would have gone to Bush anyway.

Part 3 was, essentially, a 'no decision'.

Due to the decisions in part 1 and in part 2, a part 3 decision was not required, so that is what effectively happened.

There were 4 dissenting votes on part 3, and 3 concurring votes. Two of the Justices refused to either concur or dissent (Kennedy and O'Connor). If they had concurred on this part, it would have set a legal precedent that would have been rather toxic to the power and authority of all branches of the Federal Government, *INCLUDING* the U.S. Supreme Court.

Now, obviously, I disagree with their decision, but I can totally understand why they did it.

I fully understand that there is no "popular vote" for the president. But 2000 was only the fourth time, and the first in over 100 years, that the majority (the popular vote) did not get the President they voted for.

So one has to question is the Electoral College the fairest system. Probably not when a vote in one state (sparsely populated) can be worth more than 4 times the value of a vote in another state (densely populated).

And yes you are legally correct in your answer, but I always go by "the buck stops here" and that is at the top, i.e. SCOTUS.

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

But they were recounted and those totals were published!

Where?

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/12/politics/12VOTE.html

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

And that's a good thing.

Why?

Because we aren't European.

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I fully understand that there is no "popular vote" for the president. But 2000 was only the fourth time, and the first in over 100 years, that the majority (the popular vote) did not get the President they voted for.

It's happened at least twice in the UK since WWII (that the majority party had a smaller portion of the popular vote than the opposition, 1951 and Feb 1974). Your point is?

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I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

...can still be blocked by 41 senators, however.

...expected that if the Senate was in session when an office became vacant, the president would make a standard advice and consent appointment at that time.

Rhetoric be Damned.

Sweetness.

Yap. Yep and Yup Maxed Out.

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May we All have a METAMORPHOSIS. REASON. GOoD JUDGEMENT and LOVE and ORDER!!!!!

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

But they were recounted and those totals were published!

Where?

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/12/politics/12VOTE.html

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

And that's a good thing.

Why?

Because we aren't European.

Then how come I find that USA Today says if a full recount had been done Gore would have won.

There never was an official recount, therefore we will never know the true result.

SCOTUS stopped the recount, so that we do not know who actually got most votes.

But they were recounted and those totals were published!

Where?

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/12/politics/12VOTE.html

And don't forget because you have this system of electoral votes deciding who is President, it ended up with a President who didn't win the popular vote of the people.

And that's a good thing.

Why?

Because we aren't European.

Then how come I find that USA Today says if a full recount had been done Gore would have won.

There never was an official recount, therefore we will never know the true result.

The true result is known. Bush won. Let it go.

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I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

Then how come I find that USA Today says if a full recount had been done Gore would have won.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
They are whores to the advertising money and printing facts is boring.

NY Times is a democratic newspaper, if they say Bush won ... Bush won.

There never was an official recount, therefore we will never know the true result.

The official count was the original one. Recounts are BS skewed by the people who are supposed to win.

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(Of course he may just do a recess appointment and tell them to go pound sand.)

My, how times have changed...

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/86-1960/s416

This is a Senate Resolution from the LAST time a President used a recess appointment to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court.

S.RES. 334. ADOPTION OF THE RESOLUTION.

This vote approved a nonbinding resolution proposed by the Democrats to pressure President Eisenhower to not use the recess appointment power to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court. The full title of the resolution was Expressing the Sense of the Senate That The President Should Not Make Recess Appointments to the Supreme Court, Except to Prevent or End a Breakdown in the Administration of the Court's Business.

Although the vote occurred in an election year, there is no indication that this vote was about election year appointments specifically. Eisenhower had used the special recess appointment power to make previous appointments to the Supreme Court, and Democrats objected to further use of the recess appointment power. No President has used the recess appointment power to appoint a justice of the Supreme Court since then.

A recess appointment is made while the Senate is in recess, and while such appointments do not require the usual Senate approval (as all other nominations do) they instead expire at the end of the subsequent legislative session (these days, a calendar year). The Washington Post explained:

Each of President Eisenhower’s SCOTUS appointments had initially been a recess appointment who was later confirmed by the Senate, and the Democrats were apparently concerned that Ike would try to fill any last-minute vacancy that might arise with a recess appointment. Not surprisingly, the Republicans objected, insisting that the Court should have a full complement of Justices at all times.

These days, the Senate often holds pro forma sessions, by gaveling-in for one minute each day, rather than go on recess in a time when the President is expected to use the recess appointment or pocket veto power, thus typically preventing recess appointments. On Feb. 14, 2016, President Obama stated that he would not use the recess appointment power to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Justice Scalia, which occurred during a Senate recess.

Of course, since when has the Constitution stopped Obama...

He has tried to make recess appointments before, even in the face of the pro forma sessions...

http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-recess-appointments-case-supreme-court-nlrb-2014-6

...
The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that President Barack Obama's recess appointments to fill slots on the National Labor Relations Board in 2012 were unconstitutional.

The unanimous opinion, written by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, said that Congress, and only Congress, decides when it is in session and when it is in recess. It ruled the Senate was not in a formal recess when Obama made the 2012 appointments — therefore, they were illegal.
...

http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/12-1281.html

Note: ALL 9 Supreme Court Justices said, essentially, "Bad Obama! Time-out, go sit in the corner!"

I fully understand that there is no "popular vote" for the president. But 2000 was only the fourth time, and the first in over 100 years, that the majority (the popular vote) did not get the President they voted for.

So one has to question is the Electoral College the fairest system. Probably not when a vote in one state (sparsely populated) can be worth more than 4 times the value of a vote in another state (densely populated).

And yes you are legally correct in your answer, but I always go by "the buck stops here" and that is at the top, i.e. SCOTUS.

If you understand that there is no nationwide "popular vote" for US President, then why do you keep mentioning it as if it meant something?

'vote in sparsely populated state worth more than vote in densely populated state'...

Of course it is. It has to do with the 'big state/small state' difficulty during the Constitutional Convention.

The Connecticut Compromise (also known as the Great Compromise of 1787 or Sherman's Compromise) was an agreement that large and small states reached during the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that in part defined the legislative structure and representation that each state would have under the United States Constitution. It retained the bicameral legislature as proposed by Roger Sherman, along with proportional representation in the lower house, but required the upper house to be weighted equally between the states. Each state would have two representatives in the upper house.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Compromise

The sparsely populated states were given equal representation in the Senate in order to motivate them to agree to the Constitution.

Any other system that at least in part depends on the number of Senators, such as Electors in the Electoral College is going to reflect this skew.

Remember, the People do not elect the President, the State Legislatures do.

Edit: I don't know if I would consider SOCTUS as being 'on top' in Washington. I wouldn't say its the President either....

Who is it, you ask?

<points at the Speaker of the House>

If you understand that there is no nationwide "popular vote" for US President, then why do you keep mentioning it as if it meant something?

Because I have an American friend who goes on about the state of the world since dubya and says it shouldn't have happened because he didn't win the popular vote.

Of course, since when has the Constitution stopped Obama...

He has tried to make recess appointments before, even in the face of the pro forma sessions...

http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-recess-appointments-case-supreme-court-nlrb-2014-6

...
The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that President Barack Obama's recess appointments to fill slots on the National Labor Relations Board in 2012 were unconstitutional.

The unanimous opinion, written by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, said that Congress, and only Congress, decides when it is in session and when it is in recess. It ruled the Senate was not in a formal recess when Obama made the 2012 appointments — therefore, they were illegal.
...

http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/12-1281.html

Note: ALL 9 Supreme Court Justices said, essentially, "Bad Obama! Time-out, go sit in the corner!"

Looks like you answered your own question. The Constitution stopped Obama when SCOTUS ruled it did, re-affirming the limits of both the Executive and the Judiciary.

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I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

If you understand that there is no nationwide "popular vote" for US President, then why do you keep mentioning it as if it meant something?

Because I have an American friend who goes on about the state of the world since dubya and says it shouldn't have happened because he didn't win the popular vote.

Well, I agree that Dubya was perhaps not the wisest choice. I never voted for him, not even for Texas Governor. Don't blame me for 2000. I voted for Harry Browne (L) that election.

That said, it never ceases to amaze me how many people, even US Citizens, fail to understand the US system of Government.

I repeat, the People do not elect the President, the State Legislatures do.

I have previously linked the relevant section of the US Constitution, as well as the Supreme Court decision re: the Florida 2000 election.

To change this would require a Constitutional Amendment (at the very least), and since the only way to do this short of a full-blown Constitutional Convention (which would be a highly dangerous thing, IMO) requires the approval of 3/4ths of the State Legislatures, good luck getting them to give up that power.

Remember, the People do not elect the President, the State Legislatures do.

Repeating the same error does not making it any more true than when you first said it.

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

(source)

The manner in which electors are appointed is decided by the State Legislatures, and at the moment all of them have decided this is by popular vote. While it's technically true that a State Legislature could take the power back, I'm not aware that such a proposal is under active consideration in any of them.

In other words, the People, via the delegates they vote to the Electoral College, elect the President, not the State Legislatures.

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I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

Looks like you answered your own question. The Constitution stopped Obama when SCOTUS ruled it did, re-affirming the limits of both the Executive and the Judiciary.

Ah... but what did they DO to him? For deliberately and willfully violating the Constitution, and therefore his oath of office? Jack... Diddly... Squat...

At the very LEAST it should have been removal from office.

No matter what party the person belongs to, we MUST have accountability in our Government, else all is lost.

Remember, the People do not elect the President, the State Legislatures do.

Repeating the same error does not making it any more true than when you first said it.

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

(source)

The manner in which electors are appointed is decided by the State Legislatures, and at the moment all of them have decided this is by popular vote. While it's technically true that a State Legislature could take the power back, I'm not aware that such a proposal is under active consideration in any of them.

In other words, the People, via the delegates they vote to the Electoral College, elect the President, not the State Legislatures.

You (and others) are the one who is wrong here. The manner in which the State Legislatures have set up to decide which electors to appoint does not change that it is the State Legislatures who OFFICIALLY do the voting.

My statement stands. You are breaking wind.