A panel of six legal experts debated the numerous possible outcomes of the hotly contested legal wrangling surrounding the 2000 presidential election as part of a special Friday night broadcast of “Nightline” from the Georgetown University Law Center.

Hosted by Ted Koppel, the program centered around questions from the studio audience in the Moot Court room, which Koppel said struck him as a “particularly appropriate setting for a town meeting, in which we can only hope, at best, to illuminate the political, legal and constitutional problems that now confront our nation.”

The panel was comprised of George Kogan, former chief justice of the Florida State Supreme Court, Roy Schotland of Georgetown Law School, Pamela Karlan of Stanford University Law School, Cass Sunstein of the University of Chicago Law School, Bill Lash of George Mason University Law School and Trevor Potter, former chair of the Federal Election Commission.

Sunstein said he believes the Electoral College can proceed without Florida’s votes, thanks to the framers of the Constitution. “The framers understood that the electors sometimes would not be able to do their jobs,” Sunstein said. Lash agreed and also added that he thought Florida was justified in disregarding the 19,000 disputed ballots because the American political system “assumes an intelligent, literate voter.” Karlan disagreed, saying the framers had instead established a system to allow everyone to have a vote.

Following last week’s national elections, neither Vice President Al Gore nor Texas Governor George W. Bush has of yet secured a majority of the electoral college votes because several states, including Florida, are still too close to call. On election night, the major networks prematurely called Florida twice, eventually deciding it was in fact too close to call. Since then, there have been two recounts, one by hand, and the margin in Florida is currently just under 400 votes in favor of Bush. Several lawsuits have been filed by both sides, seeking to bar the other side from demanding additional recounts or disregarding votes that were allegedly miscast. There has been no definite timeline set for resolution of the conflict.

Kogan said the Florida election system has a history of problems similar to those it is now experiencing, including 7,000 votes having been thrown out in 1996. Kogan said that never made the news because that race was not nearly as close as this one.

Sunstein said there is a precedent for a revote in federal elections, but there has never been one in a presidential election. He said the revote would be limited only to those who voted in the original vote. Potter said a revote is “very difficult to imagine,” because it will be “mechanically difficult,” and courts will be reluctant to order one.

Asked if the framers would be disappointed that Florida has too much power in this election because it hinges entirely on the state, Sunstein said Florida has no more power than intended, but that the dilemma is the closeness of the vote. He did say that the framers would be disappointed, though, because the electoral college was intended to prevent disorder and tumult.

Kogan said if a judge ultimately decides the winner of the race, it would not be undemocratic because “someone has to decide.” Sunstein agreed, saying that it wouldn’t be a political decision because of the magnitude of the situation.

The panel agreed that if the electoral college fails to come to a decision for any reason, House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) would become president, with Senate President Pro Tempore Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) next in line for succession.

Lash said the race will be realistically over when one of the candidates concedes, though legal battles could technically go on for an extended period of time.

Schotland said this election makes a good case for having a standardized federal ballot and an upgrading of voting machines.

Asked if the media’s premature calling of Florida should preclude networks from making election night projections, Koppel said, “You couldn’t ban it if you wanted to.” Sunstein said the media should police itself in the future to prevent such errors, but that there should be no laws against projections.

In an interview with The Hoya, Koppel said the incorrect projections about Florida were unavoidable. “When out of six million votes, the difference is a few hundred – nobody could have gotten this right,” Koppel said. In the past, he said, each network had its own projection numbers, but this year they all relied on the same numbers. He said the proliferation of election coverage has changed the way elections are covered. He said that if one network makes a projection of a state, “no doubt there is pressure to match it.”

Koppel said this story has not been more difficult to cover as a journalist. “What’s complicated matters is that nobody really has the answers just yet,” he said. He added that, as a journalist, he would rather be in the middle of a story than have nothing to report about, as happens during the summers of presidential campaigns.

He said he does not know how the election will resolve itself but said since former Chief of Staff to President William Jefferson Clinton (SFS ’68) Leon Panetta has indicated that Vice President Gore should concede the race, it is a very strong possibility.

Concluding the broadcast, Koppel offered a closing thought on the 2000 presidential election. “Still, you have to believe that one of these good men will, ultimately, put the nation’s interests ahead of his own,” he said. “And that man will have won a moral victory of a kind that always pays dividends down the road.”