Skip to Main Content

Answer Key: Bush v Gore Viewing Guide

  1. Who were the two major candidates in the 2000 presidential election? Vice President Al Gore and Texas Governor George W. Bush.
  2. Describe the Electoral College in your own words. Students should note that each state has a certain number of electors, and that whichever candidate wins the needed amount of electoral votes wins the election.
  3. What state did the election come down to? Florida.
  4. Why did Florida have to recount its votes? How many votes separated the two candidates after the recount? Florida law required a recount when the margin of victory was 0.5% or less. 327 votes separated the candidates after the recount.
  5. What did the Florida Supreme Court rule concerning recounted votes? The Florida Supreme Court ordered Katherine Harris to accept votes that were recounted after the deadline. It also called for a statewide manual recount, as well as a manual recount of “undervotes” in Miami-Dade county.
  6. What constitutional argument did Bush make to the U.S. Supreme Court? Bush argued that a recount would violate the Equal Protection Clause because not all votes would be recounted given each county had different standards during a recount.
  7. What constitutional argument did Gore make to the U.S. Supreme Court? Gore argued that a uniform recounting method existed.
  8. What is a Per curiam decision? A decision issued by the Court as a whole, rather than under the name of a Justice.
  9. How many decisions did the Supreme Court make? Two.
  10. Describe the Supreme Court’s decisions in your own words. The per curiam ruling stated that the Florida Supreme Court’s order violated the Equal Protection Clause. The 5-4 ruling stated that there was not enough time to form a constitutionally sound method of recounting the votes.