Time for a statesman to step from wings in US election

PALM BEACH - After this rollercoaster ride with the closest election in American history, just one thing can be said with certainty. In the process to determine the next President, the next few days will be the roughest yet.

As a rule Americans detest ties; in their favourite sports they have devised ways - whether extra innings, extra periods, or sudden death overtime to produce a result on the night. But this time, confronted with the ultimate political tie, they seem prepared to be patient. According to a poll in Newsweek, by a three to one margin the public believes that the priority was to ensure a fair and accurate vote count.

But the patience is not inexhaustible; a clear majority believed that this weekend's deadline for absentee votes in Florida should be the cut-off point. That too is the prevailing view among the great and the good; another week or so of uncertainty, fine. But that's it.

In reality, both Al Gore and George W. Bush are playing on two chessboards simultaneously: one is the terrain of hardball politics and the courts. Unchecked, the fight could drag on for weeks, through the legal system and in re-opened contests in other states where last Wednesday's result was also excruciatingly close: New Mexico, Oregon, Wisconsin and Iowa.

Today, a federal judge was to hear a request by Bush's campaign to halt hand recounts in four Florida counties and a state judge was to hear a case by supporters of Gore requesting a new poll with less confusing ballot papers in Palm Beach County.

James Baker, leading the Bush team, was in hardball mode yesterday: there had to be "finality," but if the Democrats "go on calling for recount after recount until they get the result they want in Florida, then we may be forced to demand recounts in other states where we trail narrowly."

Likewise, Baker's opposite in the Gore camp, Warren Christopher, said the Florida mess should be settled "in a matter of days" but added the proviso that the Vice-President had not ruled out filing a lawsuit of his own.

But the tactical decisions of both camps are heavily conditioned by what happens on the other chessboard, of public opinion. Thus far people are prepared to wait, but woe betide the man who appears a bad loser, or the man who treats the election as already won. Until yesterday Gore was in danger of the falling into the first trap; with his open talk of starting the transition to a new Administration, Bush was flirting with the second mistake.

The evidence from the partial manual recount that Gore may edge ahead in the state's popular vote, have probably made the Bush camp more vulnerable. He too must confront the agonisingly awkward calculation: the prize of the White House is huge - but so could be the punishment for the person the public judges to have unneccessarily prolonged the uncertainty.

Whoever accepts defeat gracefully may be certain of a footnote in history as the man who spared his country total political deadlock and of the near lock on his party's nomination to fight again in 2004. An over-tainted victory would make the presidency a prize not worth having.

This is not yet a constitutional crisis, nor a crisis of legitimacy. But the nightmare of constitutional crisis will grow if the impasse drags on. Someone will be the 43rd President, but the prospects of him being able to work smoothly with a partisan, divided Congress will diminish with every contentious day that passes.

In the end the resolution of the deadlock comes down to the two candidates themselves. "Both must behave in a manner and with a dignity worthy of the office they seek," says Sam Nunn, a former Democratic Senator.

The time when partisanship must give way to statesmanship is rapidly approaching.

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Herald Online feature: America votes