Charles Costello is the director of the
Carter Center's Democracy Program, which has played a pivotal role in
monitoring 29 elections overseas in the last decade. As a veteran of elections
monitoring, he says...
COSTELLO: An electoral system should have
a strong element of finality to it. But I think if you look at case law,
for example, in the courts and election experiences around the country,
you do have a lot of cases you can point to where re-balloting has been
done or where there is some new review of ballots as cast in which officials
try to determine whether they should be counted or not. It's just never
occurred anything like the situation we have now, where everyone can see
that you have the potential in one county in Florida to possibly change
the outcome of the race for president of the United States. It's unprecedented.
There are arguments on both sides, and you
have to weigh it very carefully. ... If you look at it from the point
of view of the voters, the votes don't belong to George Bush and Al Gore.
The votes were cast for them, but the right to vote and the right to have
your vote counted properly belongs to citizens. If you have strong evidence
that the vote count does not accurately reflect the vote of the electorate,
then it seems to me there should be a chance to question it.
