Thanks Doug, Mr. Spaw, NicoleC. / See, we can all agree on something. A good sign.

Wellstone-campaigner Guests, your intense grief & perhaps anger are entirely appropriate and understandable, and please accept sincere (really) condolence & sympathy. This was an inconceivable tragedy that took from us all a truly great man; and his & yours is a great cause, which surely does carry on.

I'm a civil-service state Elections Officer. Connecticut, not Minnesota; I don't pretend to know your election law ("There is No Such Thing as a 'National Election'" - The Pooka's Proviso) nor your politicians. But just generically: I've worked 27 years for an Elections Division under six different partisanly-elected Secretaries of the State, of both parties. And I've worked with civil-service lawyers & other staffers of state Attorneys General also partisanly elected.

Please know that I mean no disrespect or uncompassion, in urging this: don't be too quick to assume that state officials are necessarily being political, or even just stupid, in their pronouncements re the ballot situation. They MAY be, granted; no denying that. But these are tough and sometimes complicated questions---and even if they are answered in plain-but-obscure black-letter law, when a thing like this happens people, including fine lawyers (I'm not of the Bar, so I plead nolo), sometimes run around in circles squawking and clucking until some dull bureaucrat (and God bless us, every one) comes up with the correct research. Often the provisions and precedents are there, and clear, but seldom-used and thus little-known and soon-forgotten. Sometimes, on the other hand, there's been a failure to "legislate for the exceptions" (not even state lawmakers can think of everything!); then it really does get sticky.

If I had a few bucks for every newshound who asked me in 2000 why in the world we would ever dream of daring to allow such an outrage as Joe Lieberman running for Vice President and U.S. Senator at the same time, I could (I didn't say "would":) support the Mudcat singlehandedly. ("Because, Mr. Brokaw sir, there is no federal, state, or municipal law prohibiting it...Pardon? Where does it say he *CAN*? Well, where does it say I can vanilla eat ice cream if I want to & somebody agrees to give me some...nonono sir, I'm quite serious...yes, of course I'll connect you with my supervisor...")

And, people naturally fall into the Is-Ought Gap: The gulf between what the law Is, and what they, in the sudden factual circumstances of the moment, feel that it Ought to be. Of course sometimes the judiciary cooperates in this questionable amendment process; see both Florida & US Supreme Courts 2000, and New Jersey Supreme Court 2002. (I exempt the US Supremes in the NJ matter because this time they wisely stayed the Hell out of a pure State issue, as they should have in Bush v. Gore, the question there being which slate of real-live candidates had won the State office of Presidential Elector, and the relevent dispute-resolution mechanism being set forth in the US Constitution with serene disregard to any role whatsoever for the Court.)

Minnesota is a pure State issue too. It should, and hopefully will, be decided in accordance with state law. Regardless of the important, but still transitory, political/ideological consequences. If it were CT -- which it ain't & I don't cite us as a model, just an example -- the name would mandatorily come off the ballot, and the party would permissively be allowed, but of course not required (can't do that), to replace. Here the unique circumstance where the deceased candidate stays on the ballot is specifically & exclusively defined: when the death occurs within 24 hours of the opening of the polls. Then there are further provisions for what happens if, like Mel Carnahan, he wins. Legislating for the exceptions. Black-letter law.

My point (if any) is: we shouldn't, in times of stress & strife, throw out established procedures (assuming there ARE some) just because the matter involves an officeholder who was, like Paul Wellstone, a hero. *Or* who, like Bob Torricelli, *isn't*.

May Senator Wellstone rest in peace in Abraham's bosom. And, may the justice & peace for which he & his wife long struggled, prevail.