ASHINGTON - It was George W. Bush's turn to score a landmark legal victory in the battle for the White House, as the US Supreme Court agreed yesterday to hear oral arguments on Bush's challenge of the manual recounts underway in Florida.
In doing so, the court indicated that the Bush legal team has raised legitimate questions about whether the Florida Supreme Court overreached its authority when it allowed the recounts to continue this week. As tomorrow's 5 p.m. deadline for reporting approached, Vice President Al Gore was making slow headway at trimming his opponent's official 930-vote lead in the state.
Unofficial results from yesterday's hand counts found that Gore had a net gain of 246 votes, reducing Bush's statewide lead to 684.
The Florida court's decision, issued Tuesday, was a victory for Gore and allowed the manual recounts to go on in three Democratic-leaning South Florida counties. One of the counties, Miami-Dade, has since abandoned its recount, but the results of the other two are critical to Gore's hopes of becoming president.
In scheduling a Dec. 1 hearing at the request of Bush's lawyers, the US Supreme Court did not halt the recounts, and Gore's lawyers expressed confidence that they will ultimately prevail in the case.
But with their rare and sudden intercession in a state election matter, the justices displayed an apparent concern that the Florida court's ruling may have violated federal election law and improperly infringed on the powers of the Florida Legislature.
The US Supreme Court declined to consider one argument made by the Republicans - that the Florida decision violated the equal protection and due process clauses of the US Constitution because some counties were recounting votes by hand and others by machine.
But in a brief order taking up the matter, the US Supreme Court agreed to consider whether the Florida court had violated federal law by changing the rules of an election after it had taken place, and whether the Florida court intruded on the Legislature's authority to set election laws, which is cited in Article 2 of the US Constitution.
''We are pleased that the US Supreme Court has agreed to review the decision of the Florida Supreme Court,'' said Bush lawyer Ben Ginsberg. ''The court will review whether it is fair to change the rules in the middle of the game.''
The debate might seem pointless if Gore cannot pick up enough votes in the recounts in Palm Beach and Broward counties to overcome Bush's lead by tomorrow's deadline. But the Gore campaign has said that it would fight on in the courts by contesting the election over Miami-Dade's decision not to recount its ballots because there wasn't time to review them all.
Democratic operatives yesterday also said they would contest the tally in Palm Beach County, if necessary. The Democrats said they believe that a relaxed recount standard of what sort of ballot marking indicates voter intent would give Gore enough extra votes to win. But it appeared unlikely that the county's canvassing board would take that liberal a view.
''One way or another, the votes are going to be counted,'' said Jack Corrigan, a consultant for the Gore campaign.
Yesterday's ruling was the second setback in as many days for Gore, who also lost ground Thursday when the Florida Supreme Court decided not to force Miami-Dade to resume its manual recount.
In Washington, Gore's running mate, Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, said that Republican-orchestrated demonstrations outside election boards in Miami-Dade and the two other counties were ''designed to intimidate'' election officials.
''This is a time to honor the rule of law, not surrender to the rule of the mob,'' Lieberman said. Gore's lawyers in Florida echoed Lieberman's remarks about the effect of the GOP demonstrators on Miami-Dade officials, as if seeding the ground for a civil suit contesting the county's decision.
In its action yesterday, the US Supreme Court set a demanding schedule. Legal briefs are due Tuesday and responses Thursday. The justices will hear 90 minutes of oral arguments starting at 10 a.m. Friday. The high court will have less than two weeks to rule if it wishes to settle the matter before the Dec. 12 deadline for states to confirm their electoral votes.
In Broward and Palm Beach counties, where the tedious recounts continued into the evening, reaction to the high court decision was one of disbelief - among both disappointed Gore supporters and some Bush voters who had been anticipating a different outcome.
In Fort Lauderdale, where the canvassing board was examining disputed Broward County ballots for the second day, Democratic US Representative Peter Deutsch of Florida said he would be ''shocked'' if the court ultimately ruled in the Republicans' favor. Still, he put an optimistic spin on the upcoming hearing.
''There's good reason for the Supreme Court to hear it, just to resolve it,'' said Deutsch.
About 20 miles north in West Palm Beach, Republican demonstrators who had gathered outside the building where a manual recount was proceeding cheered the news from Washington as logical and fair. Only hours earlier, they had blasted the Gore campaign for its reliance on the courts.
''The Supreme Court's decision backs up our point that there are serious problems with these recounts,'' said demonstrator Thomas Whatman, who is executive director of the Ohio Republican Party. ''If the American people could be inside the rooms where these recounts are taking place, I think everyone would have serious questions about what's been going on.''
The US Supreme Court's decision caught some legal scholars by surprise. The federal courts historically have recognized election law as a matter for the states, and the current Supreme Court has made a name for itself by upholding states' rights.
''It is interesting to see the Bush people pushing the idea that a federal court should intervene,'' said Robert Jarvis, a professor of constitutional law at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale. ''They're the ones who promote state rights.''
Other scholars saw the potential power of the Bush appeal.
''The court now holds in its hands the power to decide this election,'' said University of Virginia law professor A.E. Dick Howard.
In the continuing recounts, meanwhile, Gore showed a net gain of 324 votes in Broward County, while Bush picked up 8 votes in Palm Beach County. Several other counties that are accepting additional overseas ballots or making other minor adjustments gave Bush a net gain of 70 votes.
Those figures produce a net gain of 246 votes for Gore, which cut into the 930-vote Bush lead in the tally that was certified last week by Florida's secretary of state, Katherine Harris. The latest county figures do not include 1,150 or so disputed ballots yet to be recounted in Broward and 6,000 others in Palm Beach County, where another 300,000 already reviewed ballots still must be certified before tomorrow's deadline.
On another front, lawyers for Bush were in a Tallahassee courthouse seeking to have 14 canvassing boards accept nearly 500 overseas military ballots that were not properly dated or postmarked. The Bush team has been pushing to count as many overseas ballots as possible, since they had been running about 2 to 1 for the Texas governor.
But after picking apart the Bush team's case and saying it presented no evidence that the counties violated the law when they disregarded the overseas votes, Judge L. Ralph Smith appeared to have made up his mind before the two-hour hearing had ended.
''Without any proof ... the court is very hard pressed to grant any relief,'' said Smith, who promised a ruling today.
Gorov reported from Florida, Farrell from Washington. Tina Cassidy of the Globe Staff contributed to this report from Tallahassee. Material from the Associated Press was also used.
