Toad,
As for the voting law that Bush signed:
New York Times, Novermber 12th.
"Then there is the Texas bill that Mr. Bush signed into law in 1997: it states that when Texas elections are recounted, "a manual recount shall be conducted in preference to an electronic recount."
I have heard this from a bunch of other sources as well (it's no real mystery).
As for Nixon's "graceful" exit:
You cite Earl Mazo as a source. Mazo was a conservate journalist for the New York Herald Tribune, as well as a close personal friend of Nixon, who launched a press frenzy over possible election fraud. Biased, perhaps? In any event, he's hardly a dispassionated nor uninterested party, and you can hardly expect to get the full story from him.
Your other source, Richard Reeves, had no way of knowing what Nixons actions or intentions were prior to conceding. Perhaps he did. I don't know. But all he was reporting here was what Nixon told Kennedy. Other than the fact that Nixon *did* indeed concede in relative short order, it doesn't really shed any light on this issue.
What we CAN assertain is what is on record. While Nixon was careful to not put a public
face on the massive Republican effort to challenge the election result, he not only authorized it but actively encouraged it. Publicly, Republican senators like Thruston Morton asked for recounts (yes, *recounts*) in 11 states just three days after the election. Privately, Nixon aides Bob Finch and Len Hall personally did field checks of votes in almost a dozen states. They did indeed obtain recounts, they involved US attorneys and the FBI, and impaneled grand juries. A slew of lawsuits were filed over alleged voting fraud, and appeals to state election commissions followed, albeit unsuccessfuly.
And I guess more germane to the election at hand here, with this furror over the recount, was the turn of events in 1960 Illinois. Unhappy with the results of the recount there, Republicans went to federal court, where their case was dismissed. They then appealed to the State Board of Elections, which also rejected their claims. It was not until Dec. 19 - over a month after the election - that the national Republican Party backed off its Illinois claims.
Similar results, and extended fights, took place in Texas and New Jersey among other states. In Hawaii, Republican efforts had the unintended result of reversing the state's electoral votes from Nixon to Kennedy.
That Nixon was clever enough to allow his aides and political friends to do the work on his behalf - while officially seeming to remove himself from the fray - should not let Americans have amnesia about what really happened in the wake of the 1960 vote.
-----edit-----
I think this important. In that 1960 election, some states - like California - initially fell into Kennedy's electoral count, but were reversed almost two weeks later *after absentee ballots were counted*.
Runs counter to this notion that some of you have that we oughtta just tank the election right here and now, before every vote has had a chance to be counted.
The precedent is now set. The credibility of the entire system has been called into question and we can never go back
Don't worry Toad, we've been here before. We survived it then and we'll survive this one now.
[This message has been edited by Nash (edited 11-12-2000).]
