On electing dead people:

As a guest (who was probably Dick Greenhaus) pointed out above, this isn't the first time this has happened.

In 2000, Gov. Mel Carnahan of Missouri, a Democrat, was running for US Senate against John Ashcroft, the incumbent Republican. Carnahan was killed in a plane crash 2 weeks before the election. Apparently there was no legal way Carnahan could be replaced on the ballot at that point.

On Carnahan's death, Lt. Gov. Roger Wilson succeeded him as Governor. Wilson announced that if Carnahan won, he would appoint Jean Carnahan, Mel's widow, as Senator, and that's what happened.

It seems like a good solution to me.

In 2002, US Sen. Paul Wellstone of Minnesota, a Democrat, was running for reelection against Republican Norm Coleman, who was then mayor of St. Paul. (Interestingly, George W. Bush and Karl Rove had persuaded Coleman to abandon his plan to run for Governor and run for the Senate instead.) Wellstone and his wife were killed in a plane crash 11 days before the election. Minnesota law enabled former Vice President Walter Mondale to be placed on the ballot to replace Wellstone (but not on absentee ballots which had already been mailed out). I think it was the state central committee of the Democratic Party that selected Mondale. Mondale narrowly lost to Coleman.

There are some conspiracy theorists who think both Carnahan and Wellstone were murdered, and that the conspirators learned a couple of lessons from the experience: (1) wait until it's closer to the election, and (2) get the wife, too.

But I wouldn't go that far.