[LAblondeGPhi]

Ya - in regards to the tabulation error, I've seen plenty of pageants need to re-crown a winner due to a tabulation error. In the MAO, at the local level, IF the pageant can afford to sponsor two winners to go onto state, then having multiple winners is a possibility. There are many local pageants that crown 2-3 girls in California. But at the state level, you can't really have two go on to compete at Miss America. You have to pick one, and it's only right that the "true" winner gets to move on.

As for the age eligibility, this one kind of baffles me. When I competed, I recall a hard date that you needed to still be 24 by. It was usually a month or two after the Miss America pageant. This was also the era when the national pageant switched from September to January, so we paid extra attention to the new date requirements (I imagine some women who thought they had another year of eligibility were saddened to find out otherwise, or vice versa).

I've been looking at some of the local and state websites, as well as the Miss America website, and I don't see a date cut-off, I just see "must be between 17 and 24". I would hope that the contestant paperwork that was signed was more specific. If not, Miss Delaware may have a real lawsuit.