ABA House Approves Presidential Election Resolution The ABA House of Delegates, on February 19, 2001, enacted a sweeping resolution calling for: a review of the problems occurring during the 2000 presidential election process, recommendations for changes to improve and simplify the election process, and provisions for fair and expeditious administrative and judicial review and resolution of disputes. Our Section took a leadership role in proposing an amendment to the original resolution for the ABA to take such action that was effective in building overwhelming support for the proposal. The amended resolution reads as follows: RESOLVED, That the American Bar Association supports (1) review of the nature and causes of the problems experienced in the 2000 Presidential election in connection with the casting, counting and challenging of votes for a State’s presidential electors; (2) appropriate statutory, administrative or constitutional changes designed to improve and simplify the presidential election process and ensure that it accurately reflects the will and intentions of the voters; and (3) fair and expeditious means for administrative and judicial review and resolution of potentially outcome-determinative disputes in the contests for presidential electors; and FURTHER RESOLVED, That appropriate ABA entities such as the Standing Committee on Election Law, the Sections of State and Local Government Law; Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice, and state, local, and territorial bar associations are urged to undertake these efforts. Our representatives to the ABA’s House of Delegates, David Cardwell and Jim Baird, provided a "friendly amendment" to the original proponent, Delegate Robert Weinberg of the Washington, D.C. Bar Association, who had sought to have the ABA create a new twenty-one-member Commission to undertake the study. Given that the estimated cost to the Association for the new Commission would be about $100,000, a good deal of opposition to the resolution had evolved. Believing that our Section and the Section of Administrative Law, who both have an interest in election law, along with the Standing Committee on Election Law, could perform the tasks called for without the additional expense, we offered an amendment that called for the work to be undertaken by existing sections and the Standing Committee. This gave the House of Delegates an opportunity to vote for a needed review without incurring the extra costs, and they did so by an 80 percent majority in support of our Amendment. We were also concerned in supporting the resolution that the ABA not be seen as opposing efforts for reform of what most citizens clearly believed was a faulty election process. The Los Angeles Times, in a next-day article on the ABA’s actions, reported as follows: Other ABA resolutions passed Monday include: Supporting a review of the nature and cause of voting problems in the 2000 presidential election. The ABA’s Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice was very supportive of our Amendment and they have asked us to work with them, and any other appropriate ABA entities, to study the 2000 election and make recommendations for changes and improvements when possible. If you are interested in assisting the Section in this effort (after all, who conducts more elections annually than state and local governmental units), please contact David Cardwell at 407-244-5112 or dcardwel@hklaw.com.