Justice O'Connor Upset When Seemed Gore Won -Report

Reuters Photo

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (news - web sites) was upset during an election-night party when she heard Florida was first called for Vice President Al Gore (news - web sites), exclaiming, ''this is terrible,'' according to a report in Newsweek magazine released on Sunday.

The report said O'Connor made the comment at about 8 p.m. on Nov. 7, and declared that meant the election was ``over'' because Gore had also won two other key states.

Quoting two eyewitnesses to her comments, Newsweek said that O'Connor then walked off to get a plate of food, and her husband, John, explained to friends and acquaintances that she was upset because they wanted to retire to Arizona and a Gore presidency meant they would have to wait another four years because she did not want a Democrat to name her successor.

Not long after Florida was called for Gore, news organizations retracted the call and said Florida was too close to be awarded to either candidate. The state was then called for Bush, but again that call was retracted and the race remained in limbo for five weeks.

O'Connor, 70, had been Republican majority leader of the Arizona State Senate before being appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) by President Ronald Reagan in 1981.

The magazine said in its edition due out on Monday her remarks would likely fuel criticism that high court justices ''sought to influence'' election returns in their ruling in George W. Bush (news - web sites) v. Albert Gore Jr. that ended the impasse over the presidential election.

Bush, the Republican governor of Texas, won the White House when Gore, who had sought a hand recount of thousands of contested ballots in Florida, conceded defeat on Wednesday, one day after a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling that prevented any new recounts from going forward.

Newsweek, seeking a response from Justice O'Connor to the accounts of her election-night comment, said that a high court spokesman said she had no comment.

In its story, Newsweek noted that Justice O'Connor had no way of knowing when she let her guard down that the networks' early call that Gore won Florida's key 25 electoral votes was premature and that five weeks later she would play a direct and decisive role in the election of his Republican rival.

The magazine added that O'Connor could not possibly have foreseen that she would be one of two swing votes in the court's 5-4 decision.

The Newsweek report came a day after the magazine released a poll that said Americans remained deeply divided over the Supreme Court's ruling that gave the presidency to Bush, and nearly two out of three thought politics played a role in the decision.

While 51 percent said the court's decision that hand counts of contested ballots in Florida could not resume was fair, 44 percent considered it unfair, Newsweek said.

Sixty-five percent of those surveyed believed politics or partisanship played a role in the U.S. Supreme Court justices' decision, according to the poll.

A larger proportion -- 81 percent -- saw politics playing a role in the decisions of Florida state courts, which in some cases ruled in favor of Gore during the legal battle to determine the 43rd U.S. president.

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-- KeepDigging (you@find.the.dirt), December 19, 2000

Answers

What a fucking bitch.

-- (I hope she @ BURNS.IN HELL!), December 20, 2000.

A very intelligent woman. Far superior to the two Gore Whores sitting on the out of control Florida Supreme Court.

-- Bush Supporter (Democratsstink@flashnet.com), December 20, 2000.

If this is indeed true, it just shows again(and again, and again), how damaging the two parties are to our constitution. They both need to go. Vote Libertarian.

-- KoFE (yor@town.USA), December 20, 2000.

Quite am incentive there, lady. I adjudicate one way, I can retire soon. I adjudicate another way, I work at least 4 more years. Hmm.

-- SydBarrett (dark@side.moon), December 20, 2000.

If that's indicative of the quality of her thinking and her dedication to American justice at 70, maybe it's best that she retire ASAP.

-- Bemused (and_amazed@you.people), December 20, 2000.

FLORIDA VOTERS LAUNCH EFFORT TO UNSEAT STATE SUPREME COURT JUDGES

Dec. 19, 2000 | 9:41 p.m.

By DEXTER FILKINS

MIAMI -- In one of the first signs of political fallout from the bitter struggle over the contested presidential vote here, a Republican-led group is seeking to unseat three Florida Supreme Court justices who ruled in favor of the hand recounts sought by Vice President Al Gore.

The group, called the Emergency Florida State Supreme Court Project, has sent letters to 350,000 voters inside and outside of Florida asking for donations to help oust Chief Justice Charles T. Wells and Justices Leander J. Shaw Jr. and Harry Lee Anstead.

The three justices formed part of the unanimous, 7-0 ruling last month that overturned a lower court and ordered Secretary of State Katherine Harris to accept updated vote totals from three counties that were manually recounting disputed presidential ballots.

All three justices were appointed by Democratic governors to six-year terms. Anstead and Wells face Florida voters in 2002 in a yes-or-no judicial retention election. Shaw is scheduled to retire in 2003.

Several Florida Supreme Court justices have been targeted for removal since judicial retention came into force in 1976, but none has been removed that way so far.

The letter, mailed Friday, is signed by Mary McCarty, a Republican county commissioner in Palm Beach County. In the letter, McCarty, a 10-year commissioner, calls the Florida Supreme Court's behavior in the presidential election ``an outrageous, arrogant power-grab by a left-wing court which is stuck in the liberal '60s.''

In the letter, McCarty asks recipients to send as much as $1,000 for to help pay for ``grass-roots organizations, telephones, postage, television and radio advertising.'' The letter said another group, called the Committee to Take Back Our Judiciary, had also been formed to help remove the justices. Two of the justices singled out by the group dissented from the Florida Supreme Court's 4-3 ruling earlier this month ordering a statewide hand count of the estimated 45,000 ballots that had not been tabulated by the vote counting machines. Wells and Shaw disagreed with the court majority, of which Anstead was part.

The letter by the Emergency Florida State Supreme Court Project follows an effort announced last week to unseat Anstead. ``Balance to the Bench'' announced plans to raise about $1 million in the next 90 days to campaign against Anstead in 2002.

That group is being formed by Susan Johnson of Orlando, the wife of former Los Angeles Dodgers manager Davey Johnson; Sam Rashid, a Plant City Republican; and Bill O'Dea, a retired Tampa insurance executive.

The efforts seem likely to touch off a nasty political battle over the proper role of the judiciary and the legacy of the 2000 presidential election. A prominent Tallahassee lawyer said he was forming a group to help the judges fight the effort. Steven Uhlfelder, a Democrat who campaigned for George W. Bush, said the effort to unseat the justices marked an unnecessary intrusion of politics into the judiciary.

Under the judicial retention system, Florida Supreme Court justices are sharply limited in how they wage their campaigns and what they may say in public.

Democratic officials criticized the effort, saying it threatened to politicize a branch of government that was designed to stand above partisan politics.

``This violates the whole principle of separation of powers,'' said Rep. Lois Frankel, D-West Palm Beach, the minority leader in the Florida House.

NYT-12-19-00 2234EST

http://www.postnet.com/postnet/news/wires.nsf/National/4E00E84B279B28B D862569BB0013C48A?OpenDocument

-- Bud (this@one.foryou), December 20, 2000.

Apparently she can play golf.

Made her first hole-in-one at her home course (Paradise Valley, AZ) this past Sunday.

Geez, I hope I don't have to wait till I'm 70 to make my first one!

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), December 20, 2000.