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The election for governor of Washington on November 2, 2004 gained national attention for its legal twists and extremely close finish. Notable for being among the closest political races in United States election history, Republican Dino Rossi was declared the winner in the initial automated count and again in the subsequent automated recount. It wasn't until after the third count, a second recount done by hand, that Christine Gregoire, a Democrat, took the lead by a margin of 129 votes. Although Gregoire was sworn in as Governor of Washington on January 12, 2005, Rossi did not formally concede and called for a re-vote over concerns about the integrity of the election. The Republican Party filed a lawsuit in Chelan County Superior Court contesting the election, but the trial judge ruled against it, citing lack of evidence of deliberate electoral sabotage.〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=SeattleWeekly.com )〕 Rossi chose not to appeal to the Washington State Supreme Court, formally conceding the election on June 6, 2005. == The primaries == The 2004 election cycle was the first in Washington to use a party-line ballot system of holding primary elections. The state had a long tradition of using blanket primaries, where the candidates of all political parties appear together on the same ballot for all voters. In this system, the leading vote-getter from each party advances to the general election. Washington's voters are not registered by party affiliation and a voter could participate in selecting candidates for more than one party, although the voter could only choose one candidate (of whatever party) for each office. In February 2004 the United States Supreme Court declined to review a lower court decision striking down the blanket primary as unconstitutional, based on it violating the rights of the parties to freedom of association under the First Amendment. Washington was thus forced to devise a new primary election system. The state legislature passed a bill providing that the top two vote-getters for each office in the primary would advance to the general election, regardless of which political party they belonged to. Voters would still be allowed to vote for any candidate as before. However, this measure was vetoed by Governor Gary Locke in favor of a Montana-style system that requires voters to choose a ballot for one specific party and vote only on that party's candidates in the primary. The primary election in 2004 was held using the new system, but a campaign to replace it was already underway. The Washington State Grange, which had helped institute the blanket primary in 1935, filed Initiative 872 to implement the "top-two" primary instead, which would once again allow voters to cross party lines in the primary election but now send the top two vote-getters to the general election. In districts dominated by one party, the top-two system could result in Democrat- or Republican-only general election races. Supporters claimed it would bring back voter choice across party lines and allow independent voters to participate in the primary; opponents said it would exclude third parties and independent candidates from general election ballots, and would in fact reduce general election voter choice. The initiative was put to a public vote in November 2004, and passed with 60% of the vote.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Elections for partisan offices )〕 The state Republican, Democratic and Libertarian parties sued,〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Top-Two Primary Litigation )〕 however, and a federal district court judge ruled in 2005 that the measure was unconstitutional because it too infringed the parties' First Amendment right to select their own candidates. Washington continued with the party-line primary system while appealing the case. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Washington gubernatorial election, 2004」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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