Florida 2000 and Washington 2004

"The majority report lays the blame for the supposed 'disenfranchisement' of black voters at the feet of state officials—-particularly Governor Jeb Bush and Secretary of State Katherine Harris. In fact, however, elections in Florida are the responsibility of 67 county supervisors of election. And, interestingly, in all but one of the 25 counties with the highest spoilage rates, the election was supervised by a Democrat—the one exception being an official with no party affiliation.

The majority report argues that much of the spoiled ballot problem was due to voting technology. But elected Democratic Party officials decided on the type of machinery used, including the optical scanning system in Gadsden County, the state's only majority black county and the one with the highest spoilage rate."

(Thernstrom & Redenbaugh, 2001)

Peter Kirsanow tells us that,

"State officials were not at fault for widespread voter "disenfranchisement". The myth holds that Governor Bush, in league with Secretary of State Katherine Harris, either by design or incompetence, failed to fulfill their electoral responsibilities, resulting in the discriminatory disenfranchisement of thousands of black voters. This was purportedly a key to the overarching Republican plot to steal the election from Al Gore.

Again, reality intrudes. The uncontroverted evidence shows that by statute the responsibility for the conduct of elections is in the hands of county supervisors, not the governor or secretary of state. County supervisors are independent officers answerable to county commissioners, not the governor or secretary of state. And in 24 of the 25 counties that had the highest ballot-spoilage rates, the county supervisor was a Democrat. (In the remaining county the supervisor was not a Republican, but an independent.)"

(Kirsanow, 2004)

In other words, all responsibility for the integrity of the election process--including the selection and implementation of voting technologies, all technical support and training, all training of poll workers, oversight of voter registration, management of the absentee ballot process, and more--lies with county officials only, not the governor or Secretary of State.

At this point careful readers might be wondering what "statute" provided them with this "uncontroverted” evidence. It stands to reason that the responsibilities of county supervisors, the Secretary of State, and the governor regarding the oversight of elections would have been defined by the Florida State Legislature and any serious professional who wanted to see "reality intrude" would have checked the state's constitution and statutes. Predictably, neither Kirsanow or Thernstrom and Redenbaugh cited any such information. For that matter, neither did anyone else I could find.

Since they refuse to, perhaps we should.

According to the Florida State Constitution the Governor's office has the authority and the responsibility for ensuring that all state and federal laws regarding elections are executed (FL. State Const., Art. 4, Sect. 1a). The governor also has the power, and the responsibility for appointing special officers to investigate alleged violations of the election laws (FL. Stat., 2000, Ch. 102.091). As of the USCCR report, and Thernstrom and Redenbaugh's dissent, this had not been done despite the wealth of evidence for widespread irregularities that has already been presented in this paper.

Under Florida State law, the Secretary of State's office is responsible for the following;

• Obtain and maintain uniformity in the application, operation, and interpretation of the election laws;
• Provide uniform standards for the proper and equitable implementation of the registration laws;
• Actively seek out and collect the data and statistics necessary to knowledgeably scrutinize the effectiveness of election laws;
• Coordinate the state's responsibilities under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993;
• Provide training to all affected state agencies on the necessary procedures for proper implementation of this chapter;
• Ensure that all registration applications and forms prescribed or approved by the department are in compliance with the Voting Rights Act of 1965;
• Coordinate with the United States Department of Defense so that armed forces recruitment offices administer voter registration in a manner consistent with the procedures set forth in this code for voter registration agencies;
• Maintain a voter fraud hotline and provide election fraud education to the public.
• Create and maintain a Central Voter File;
• Adopt rules establishing standards for voting systems, and certification of the voting systems chosen by each county.
• Provide technical assistance to the supervisors of elections for these voting systems.
• Provide technical assistance to the supervisors of elections on voter education and election personnel training services;
• Provide voter education assistance to the public;
  
  (FL. Stat., 2000, Ch. 97.012)

Note the last five in particular.

Create and maintain a Central Voter File:   In other words, create and maintain a record or all Florida citizens with a legal, constitutionally guaranteed right to vote for their leaders. This includes the responsibility for making sure that list is accurate--that it does not include convicted felons or deny anyone their vote due to wrongful felon or denial of legal clemency status.

Adopt rules establishing standards for voting systems, and certification of the voting systems chosen by each county:   Establish guidelines for selection of all county level voting systems and rules guaranteeing quality control in their setup and use, and certify whether each county's system meets the necessary requirements.

Provide technical assistance to the supervisors of elections on voting systems:   Provide all needed technical support and training necessary to guarantee that these voting systems are operated and maintained in an efficient and reliable manner.