ASHINGTON - They were the graybeards, the grown-ups, the veteran negotiators who had the image and credentials to bring a sensible and speedy end to the partisan mayhem in Florida.
So much for that idea.
Former secretaries of state Warren Christopher and James A. Baker III are trained diplomats, both with impressive records. But it is for their other talents - as political lawyers - that Christopher has been employed by Vice President Al Gore, and Baker by Governor George W. Bush.
The two septuagenarians, who describe themselves as old friends, have met just once since they were sent to help resolve the unresolved election. That was more than a week ago.
Since then, Baker and Christopher have been acting not as statesmen or negotiators, but as adversarial mouthpieces for the two campaigns.
''They're best known as being secretaries of state,'' said James Pinkerton, a former White House aide in the Reagan and Bush administrations. ''But they're lawyers at heart, and the legalisms are showing through.''
''They're front men,'' said Michael Birkner, a professor at Gettysburg College. ''They provide the kind of gravitas the situation calls for,'' while the campaigns toss accusations and lawsuits at each other.
Distinguished images aside, ''it doesn't really seem like they've been called in to resolve this problem,'' said Dean Spiliotis of Dartmouth College. The legal claims and counter-claims have ''really turned things harsh,'' he said.
Such was not the case when the two men arrived, stirring hope and hoopla, in Florida last week. For much of their long and eventful careers, Christopher and Baker have starred in delicate negotiations, bringing warring sides to the table on such daunting issues as racial turmoil in Los Angeles or the reunification of Germany.
Moreover, they could point to their personal relationships with the two presidential candidates: Christopher headed the vice presidential search committee that led to Gore being picked as Bill Clinton's running-mate in 1992, while Baker served as secretary of state and managed President George Bush's campaign that year.
Christopher also served as head of the Clinton-Gore transition team in 1992 and as President Clinton's first secretary of state, from 1993-97.
The 75-year-old Christopher is perhaps best known for his work to help free the American hostages held by Iran in 1981. He twice served on commissions to examine racial troubles - first in 1965-66 and again in 1991, following the riots spurred by the Rodney King beating.
Baker, 70, was President Reagan's chief of staff and treasury secretary before serving as secretary of state during the Bush administration. He also served as chief of staff and tried to help salvage the elder Bush's flailing reelection campaign in 1992.
Baker's inability to pull out a victory then caused some ripples of discontent within the Bush family. His recent mission could be his vindication, if Baker manages to ensure a Bush victory in Florida.
Baker is a perfect pick for the task at hand, said Rich Bond, who was GOP national chairman in 1992. ''Jim Baker has a kind of personal viscosity in him, where he can be a top-notch political operative at the same time he is being a world leader. That is an enormous amount of talent.''
In style, the two former Cabinet members are good matches for their clients. Like Bush, the Texas-born Baker wears cowboy boots and is known for his blunt manner of speaking. Like Gore, the North Dakota-born Christopher, impeccably dressed in well-tailored suits, is seen as dour, even wooden, in appearance.
''Neither man was a popular secretary of state at the State Department, said Howard Shaffer, a former ambassador to Bangladesh who served under both men. ''Both men are respected, but neither was viewed in the same way as, say, Henry Kissinger,'' said Shaffer, who is now director of studies at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University.
Christopher was seen at State as a ''talented lawyer,'' Shaffer said. But ''his skills as a diplomat, when contrasted with his reputation as a lawyer, was not, I think, much prized by Foreign Service officers.''
Baker, meanwhile, is viewed as a hard-driving negotiator, relentless in his defense of his client.
With the Florida dispute now mired in state and federal courts, there is little likelihood that Baker and Christopher will negotiate a compromise, observers say.
''Negotiation is not really useful if there's no remote agreement as to what the goal is,'' Pinkerton said. ''How do you negotiate, `I win, you lose?' This is total war, and warriors trump diplomats.''
The most painful task is yet to come for one of the former diplomats. One of them is going to admit defeat and tell either Gore or Bush that he has lost and must give up the fight to be the first president of the new millennium.
''That's part of the role,'' said Gettsburg College's Birkner. ''They're the guys who are going to have to say how it is.''
