The current electoral system is based upon the 12th Amendment to the Constitution in 1804. The overall popular vote of the country is not a basis for choosing our president. This has heppened in 1876 when Hayes won over Tilden. 1888 when Harrison won over Cleveland. And again in 2000 when Bush won over Gore. For purposes of the Guiness Book of World Records, the 2000 election was the closest according to popular vote, but the 1876 election was closest in regards to electoral vote (a separation of a single electoral vote). But was 2000 the closest overall election? How about the election of 1800 where the pre-12th Amendment electors couldn't decide and it went to the House to decide, and after 36 runoffs in the House, Jefferson won over Burr.
But no discussion of the 2000 election is complete with our lovable Florida. At no time during all the recount fun did Gore lead in the vote count in Florida. There were many speculations that "if this" and "if that" then Gore would pull ahead. This is a logical fallacy known as "affirming the consequent" thought some in the news have reargued it based upon "denying the antecedent." Both argument types are logical fallicies and are given that name for a reason. Gore was never ahead. The election was never his. It was never stolen from him. The resulting charade in the House of Representatives after the fact was simply a charade as the House representatives did not have a legal role at this point in the election and they were simply grandstanding their opinions.
Also based in the Constitution, is the Supreme Court which ruled on the proceedings of the election in Florida. They denyed the arguments placed by Lawrence Tribe on behalf of Vice President Gore. I respect the work that Tribe has done, particularly in the areas of the Consititution...he is truly one of the great constitutional scholars of our time, however, he is not a Supreme Court Justice. Tribe's opinion disagrees with that Court decision as he has with other decisions (I've disagreed with a SC decision or three myself), but Tribe said that the place of the high court in American life "is such that we all should rally around, even if we disagree with the results." The Supreme Court decision was actually two decisions, one was 5-4 in favor of Bush, the other was 7-2 in favor of Bush.
After the election, different media organizations ran a "what-if" study...all of the studies concluded that Bush would have won even if the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Gore plan for recount. One study played a "what if" scenario based upon a recount method that was never suggested by Gore...in this case, according to the news outlet's study, Gore would have won.
</book>