Special Election Law Issue This is the most important newsletter issue during the three-year period in which I have been the editor. The prospect of a candidate who wins the popular vote but yet loses the election is one that cuts across the grain of all we hold sacred in our democracy. Reading this issue's articles compelled me to ponder the thought that our democracy sometimes hangs by a very slender thread which can be irreparably damaged in the absence of constant vigilance. In 1876, when Rutherford B. Hayes, with the assistance of President Ulysses Grant, purportedly stole the election from Samuel Tilden, who had won the popular vote by a margin of 250,000, the country was almost brought to the brink of another civil war. We were a young democracy then and our faith in our institutions, only eleven years after the Civil War, had not had the opportunity to ripen. Nevertheless, the 2000 election, fraught with allegations of partisan participation in election fraud, denial of the franchise to specific populations, and inept voting processes has shaken everyone's heretofore-unquestioned faith in the manner in which our public officials are elected. In addition, the nearly unanimous outrage vented at the Supreme Court in light of its unabashed partisan political meddling has also raised questions about the independence of our judiciary. The authors of the articles provide us with incisive information regarding the process involving recounts, the "rightness" of the Supreme Court decision, the need for a Twenty-Eighth Amendment to the Constitution, the desirablity of new technology in the election process, a focus on the heretofore ignored Fifteenth Amendment in the context of the effect of the process on African-Americans and the problem of simply reporting what was happening while it was happpening. The contributors to this issue ably address all of these points and propose solutions which, if implemented, will go a long way in restoring our belief in our system of democracy. -Dale Rubin, Editor State & Local Law News