Recounts continue in advance of high court decision

Monday, November 20th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

TALLAHASSEE, Florida (CNN) -- In Florida, as votes are being recounted by hand today in three heavily Democratic counties, the state Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether those numbers should be included in the state's final tally.

George Bush and the Republicans say "no," depicting the hand recount process as riddled with human error and Democratic bias. Al Gore and the Democrats say "yes," arguing that a hand recount would more accurately reflect the intentions of voters.

Starting at 2 p.m. EST, each side gets an hour to makes its case before the high court. The opinion delivered by the seven justices could determine America's president-elect, a position still unfilled nearly two weeks after the November 7 election.

As the recounting goes on, much of the partisan debate focuses on chad, the tiny pieces of paper that fall out when a punch-card vote is cast.

Latest developments:

â€¢ Bush, who is governor of Texas, went to the Capitol in Austin for several hours of work Monday morning, telling reporters he is "feeling great."

â€¢ Gore, who is in Washington, was to address the Family Re-Union Conference in Nashville, Tennessee, via satellite.

â€¢ A state judge in Palm Beach County is scheduled to rule whether he has the authority under the U.S. Constitution to order a new presidential election in the county, where Democrats say the so-called butterfly punch-card ballot confused voters and resulted in miscast votes.

â€¢ A state judge in heavily Republican Seminole County scheduled a hearing today on a lawsuit filed by a Democratic activist. The suit claims that the GOP was given improper access to county election offices to help fix paperwork errors on 4,700 absentee ballots.

â€¢ A hand recount in Miami-Dade County began today after completion of a machine count to isolate questionable ballots. Election officials will use their discretion to determine whether those ballots should be counted by hand.

â€¢ A state judge may hold a hearing today on the Miami-Dade recount. Republicans want to stop it, arguing that the repeated handling of punch-card ballots could alter a voter's intention.

â€¢ A hand recount resumed today in Palm Beach County.

â€¢ A hand recount resumed today in Broward County, where Republicans accuse the three-member canvassing board of bowing to political pressure from Democrats. The board, which originally decided to disqualify dimpled or one-corner chad, later reversed itself. Those ballots are now being set aside for examination and consideration as valid votes.

â€¢ Broward County hopes to finish its hand recount by today; Palm Beach County by the end of the week. But Miami-Dade expects to take until December 1.

â€¢ Florida Sen. Bob Graham, a Democrat, called today for hand recount of votes in all 67 Florida counties.

â€¢ Florida Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Miami Republican, said today that while he finds the recounting process flawed, he is not questioning the integrity of Florida's vote counters themselves. "I have full respect for the individuals involved," Diaz-Balart said.

â€¢ In advance of today's oral arguments before the Florida Supreme Court, the Bush and Gore campaigns and Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris filed written papers to explain their positions.

â€¢ The Republicans and Harris say she is within her authority under state law to certify election results without accepting hand counts. The Bush campaign also maintains that allowing the recounts to continue in selected Democratic-leaning counties violates the constitutional rights of voters elsewhere.

â€¢ Democrats argue that Harris has leeway to wait for the hand count results -- and should have done so. Gore's legal team also asks the court to set a generous standard for election officials to "ascertain the electorate's will" when punch-card ballots were cast. They said local election officials in close cases can "determine the voter's intent" by closely examining the ballot.

â€¢ The Florida Supreme Court rejected a motion from Harris that the 120 minutes scheduled for today's oral arguments be divided three ways so that she could present her own arguments.

â€¢ Regardless of how the partisan fight turns out, U.S. President Bill Clinton does not believe his successor will be politically crippled and unable to govern the nation. "I don't think we should have all these hand-wringing, dire predictions," Clinton told CNN on Sunday. The president rejected the idea that the contested election leaves the United States in a constitutional crisis.

What's at stake
Hundreds of overseas absentee ballots mailed to Florida counties were rejected for late postmarks, postmarks from within the United States or lack of witness signatures. A final tally of acceptable overseas absentee ballots showed Bush expanding his lead in the state to 930 votes out of 6 million cast.

Gore narrowly leads in the nationwide popular vote and holds a slight edge over Bush in the all-important Electoral College tally. But neither candidate will reach the required 270 electoral votes to be declared the nation's 43rd president without Florida's 25 electors.

Gore's campaign hopes the full hand recounts in the three counties, where as many as 1.7 million ballots were cast, will add to his vote total.

CNN National Correspondent Tony Clark, Correspondents Patty Davis, Mark Potter, Susan Candiotti, Jeff Flock, Bill Hemmer, Charles Zewe, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report, written by CNN.com Senior Writer Jim Morris.