If the number of provisional ballots cast outnumbers the votes by which Bush or Kerry is ahead in one or more states upon which the presidential race hinges, legal analysts say, the brawl over whether and how to count them will make the pre-election litigation battles look like schoolyard skirmishes.
The Machinery
If all the other hurdles are overcome, there is still the matter of technology. One of the lessons learned from the Florida debacle four years ago was that the country's error-prone election equipment was unable to produce a clear winner in a razor-thin election.
Some states, including Florida, moved quickly to scrap the widely discredited punch-card machines that left officials struggling to divine voter intent from hanging chads; the percentage of registered voters using electronic voting machines has more than doubled in the past four years.
But about 32 million voters in 19 states will still use punch-card ballots.
Nowhere will the discredited machinery be more widespread than in Ohio, where 72 percent of voters will use punch cards. With its 20 electoral votes, the state is considered crucial by Bush and Kerry.
In Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland, poll workers have been given strict instructions to tell every voter to "check for hanging chads." But election officials there are also praying for intervention.
Election director Michael Vu recently gave candles to top managers, lighting one during a conference call last week with board attorneys who were monitoring several of the lawsuits to hit the state in the final days of the campaign.
On the front of the candle is "Our Lady of Fair Elections," pictured with a pile of ballots at her feet. On the back, a plea:
"I place my feeble vote in your hands that mine might be counted," it reads. "Ensure each chad is completely removed . . . and give me the patience to endure as many recounts as I must."
Staff writers Ceci Connolly in Philadelphia and Manuel Roig-Franzia in Miami contributed to this report.
