Turnout Heavy As America Votes

At a church in Washington, D.C. the line was an hour long. At a middle school in the Bronx it stretched down the block. In Colorado, they waited outside despite temperatures in the single digits.

With a tight presidential race on the line, Americans went to the polls Tuesday — in massive numbers.

Opinion surveys gave little hint of who would win that race. A new CBS News poll shows President Bush and John Kerry in a statistical dead heat, with Mr. Bush leading by 2 points among likely voters — within the margin of error. Other polls agreed.

With the race so close, interest very high and registration rolls flush with hundreds of thousands of new voters, elections officials expected heavy turnout this year. Some polls project Election Day 2004 may see the largest proportion of eligible people voting in a generation.

It could also see controversies and legal disputes over close races in one or more swing states. Courts were already in action as Election Day dawned, with a federal appeals court approving a GOP plan to station observers in polling places in Ohio. In Florida, the counting of absentee ballots began, but thousands were delayed going out.

For Kerry, the long campaign continued. Planning to vote later in Boston, he handed out information packets in the morning to volunteers in La Crosse, Wis., exhorting his supporters to "get the job done."

"We're going to take America to a better place," the Massachusetts senator promised.

Mr. Bush, voting in Texas, said, "I've given it my all." Kerry, still campaigning in Wisconsin, promised to take the nation "to a better place."

Overnight, the Bush campaign sent an e-mail from the president exhorting people to vote — "It comes down to today" — and asking that the recipient forward the e-mail to five more people. Kerry e-mailed a similar call to arms: "When you go to the polls bring your friends, your family, your neighbors. No one can afford to stand on the sidelines or sit this one out."

Americans appeared to be listening.

Long lines were reported at precincts from Florida and North Carolina to West Virginia and Michigan.

"We even had people waiting in line before we opened at 6:30 a.m.," said Wayne County Clerk Robert Pasley in Wayne, W.Va. "In some places, there was more than a dozen people waiting, and that's heavy."

Rain was falling in parts of the Midwest as voters lined up. Brian Fravel, a 43-year-old welder who lives in Columbus, Ohio, said he had never before had to wait to vote. When he arrived at the Northland Church of Christ at 7:30 a.m., he found a long line of people and waited 45 minutes to cast a ballot. "I thought I was early enough to beat it," Fravel said.

At the Swift Creek Community Center in Raleigh, N.C, the line snaked out from the small, cinderblock building, across a gravel parking lot and along the street.

By 7:15 a.m., the queue to get into the voting booths at Temple Beth Zion-Beth Israel in Philadelphia stretched for half a city block.

At Saint John's Presbyterian Church near downtown Detroit, about 120 people were lined up to vote shortly after the polls opened at 7 a.m.

Election officials in Nashua, N.H.'s ward 1 said when the doors opened at 6 a.m., more than 200 people were in line.

The nation's first votes cast and counted on Election Day, in the mountain hamlet of Hart's Location, N.H., reflected in miniature what seemed likely to be writ large across the country: a horse race in votes, not just polls.

Following a quirky tradition of post-midnight voting in New Hampshire's North Country, 16 people voted for Mr. Bush, 14 for Kerry and one for Ralph Nader. Mr. Bush beat Democrat Al Gore 17-13 in the hamlet in 2000.

The prospect of unprecedented legal challenges hung over Election Day, each side sending thousands of lawyers into motion to monitor the flood of newly registered voters and mount hair-trigger challenges against any sign of irregularity.

"My hope of course is that this election ends tonight," Mr. Bush told reporters, referring to the expected legal challenges in some districts. He won the presidency in 2000 only after a Supreme Court decision gave him Florida and the Electoral College majority.

For his part, Kerry made Election Day appearances in Wisconsin, where residents can register and vote on the same day. Of the reports of long voter lines, he said, "It's just a magical kind of day."

There were scattered problems amid the magic. Five locations in Franklin County, Ohio, opened up to a half-hour late because poll workers did not show up on time.

In Essex, Md., an election judge left a polling place briefly, saying he forgot something at home. Voters who had to wait were allowed to vote by provisional ballot.

One polling location in Mauldin, S.C., was forced to switch to paper ballots because of equipment troubles.

In Volusia County, Fla., a memory card in an optical-scan voting machine failed Monday at an early voting site and didn't count 13,000 ballots. Officials planned to feed and count those ballots Tuesday.

The climax of the 2004 campaign found the electorate in the same state it was a week, a month and even four years ago — sharply divided, deadlock over who should lead. Polls found not only a sizzling contest but a sense among people that this election counted more than others in the recent past.

CBS News Early Show contributor Craig Crawford said turnout will be the key factor in election 2004.

"Today, for both parties, it's like you host a party and you get a nervous feeling. 'How many people are going to show up?' or 'Will anybody show up?'" he said. "We think a lot of people will show up."

A big turnout "probably means a Democratic advantage," Crawford said.

Democratic vice presidential nominee Sen. John Edwards told the Early Show that turnout is "absolutely critical."

"That's why we've been urging people to early vote in states where early voting is permitted," he said, adding that he was confident Kerry-Edwards people would get to the polls in large numbers because, "Our voters are very motivated, passionate."