FIRST MAKE THE RULES, THEN FOLLOW THEM: James Joyner elegantly sums up why it's better to follow the rules set down by the legislature, than to chase an impossible standard of fairness through the courts:
. . . every time I've voted, there have been election observers from the two political parties. There's no better way that I can think of to assure people that there is no misconduct taking place in heavily partisan precincts. That said, I could see where having hordes of challengers could disrupt the process.
This is yet another case, though, where the legislature is a more legitimate body to make decisions on such issues than the courts. The advantage of having the legislature make these choices--as they had already done by passing the statute, signed by the governor--is that they are made a priori. When judges get involved, by definition, a specific case in controversy exists and there is therefore knowledge of which party a specific application of a rule will advantage. In this case, a single political appointee has made two crucial judgments that may call the most heated state contest into question. That's not good for a democratic system.
