The United States election results reveal a divided and polarised society and will hugely complicate the task of whoever is elected president eventually. The extraordinary impasse arising from Florida's vote may take several days to resolve - assuming it is not contested legally. But already it is clear that Mr Al Gore has won the majority of the popular vote, even though he could well lose the election in the electoral college. Whichever man wins will have great difficulty in claiming legitimacy to assert and implement a mandate. That is likely to make for incremental, cautious government rather than radical departures in domestic policy.
The presidential election will be remembered for many years because of its dramatic political turnabouts and the hubris of the television networks which called the Florida result incorrectly. It more than fulfilled all the predictions of an exciting finale. This is based on the remarkably even performance of the two main candidates. But their respective appeals also express a national mood politically divided between men and women, whites and blacks, rich and poor and even geographically, with the coastal states voting largely for the Democrats while the vast inland interior opted for the Republicans. These cleavages are clearly revealed in exit poll studies of the electorate. Provisional estimates say turnout was up only a few percentage points on average, taking in only half of those entitled to vote.
Full assessments of the results await the final outcome. There is little doubt that Mr Gore narrowed the gap substantially in the closing stages of the campaign - and that his final performance was crucially affected by that of the Green Party candidate, Mr Ralph Nader. Mr Bush fought a very effective campaign and must be presumed the more likely victor. He certainly wore that mantle in his statement last evening. If that proves to be the case, Mr Bush would have a very narrow mandate but would enjoy the support of a Republican-controlled Senate and House of Representatives, which to some extent would compensate.
Such circumstances would optimise the conciliatory approach to governing which Mr Bush emphasised during the campaign. But it would make it much more difficult for him to carry through his ambitious plans for a radical tax cut. The same considerations would upset Mr Gore's more far-reaching plans were he to emerge the victor. He might find a Republican-controlled Congress especially troublesome, given the rhetorical cast of his campaigning. Whoever wins will be dogged by the anomalies thrown up in such a finely balanced result. But there are many remarkable changes in both houses of Congress, of which Mrs Hillary Clinton's victory in New York is much the most dramatic and significant.
From the perspective of US domestic policy it would probably be wise not to expect too many radical departures after these results. Voters appear to have opted for more of the same, divided between the beneficiaries and relative losers of such a period of unprecedented economic growth. But it cannot be presumed that this will last indefinitely. The economy will adjust sooner or later. That will require firm government to manage the transition.
In the same way the United States's international role cannot remain as stable and predominant as most voters appear to have assumed. Major political and economic changes will emerge in coming years, requiring political leadership and skill to manage effectively. On the face of it, that is made more difficult by these results, quite aside from the clear differences between the Bush and Gore foreign policy platforms. Just as in domestic affairs, a full assessment of this international dimension cannot be undertaken until we know who is to be the next president.