On December 12, 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its per curiam decision in Bush v. Gore. At issue was the winner of the 2000 presidential election, between the vice president, Albert Gore, Jr., and the Texas governor, George W. Bush. The two were separated by only some 200 votes—out of more than five million cast—in Florida, which held the decisive electoral college votes needed by each candidate to win the presidency. Al Gore had challenged the accuracy of the Florida vote totals, calling for selective hand recounts. George W. Bush defended these totals and challenged the validity of recounting votes by hand. The case eventually reached the Supreme Court. By a 5-4 vote, the Court ruled that Florida’s methods of recounting votes were so disorganized and diverse from county to county that they amounted to an unconstitutional violation of the equal protection clauses of the Constitution and of the Fourteenth Amendment. In addition, the ruling held that as the time allowed for counting votes had expired, the Florida recounts were finished and the candidate ahead at that time, George W. Bush, was the winner of the Florida vote—and hence became the forty-third president of the United States.