For Democrats and Republicans in 2004 the word "Florida" still holds an almost holy appeal and fervor, but for entirely different reasons.

For many Democrats, the state is the site of electoral grand theft -- the place where they believe voting irregularities and a halted recount cost 2000 presidential candidate Al Gore the presidency he rightfully earned.

Florida Republicans on the other hand say that voters have given them a mandate to run the state by electing Gov. Jeb Bush to two terms, and sending GOP majorities to both houses of the legislature.

Though both parties have made huge efforts to gain a solid advantage, the state remains closely divided and its political profile continues to be a changing portrait shaped by growth, migration and immigration.

The current eclectic population is a reflection of the state's heritage. Throughout its history, Florida has been under Spanish, English, French, American and Confederate rule. Just as the European powers clashed over control of the huge peninsula known for its riches and strategic location, modern American presidential hopefuls battle for its bounteous supply of 27 electoral votes.

More than any other issue, growth has proven to be the key to Florida's political history -- and no region of the state has grown more rapidly than South Florida. Between the 1960s and 1980s, Miami replaced Jacksonville as the state's political power center.

South Florida had been a major retirement destination with elderly northerners making permanent homes there. A large influx of Cuban exiles -- either fleeing or expelled by Fidel Castro -- also filled the region from the late 1950s to the early 1970s. The Cuban community proved to be economically and politically powerful. Miami-Dade County passed a statute making itself officially bilingual -- codifying and legitimizing Cuban influence and culture.

The Cuban community has also been solidly Republican in national elections since the 1980s, but some of that allegiance has begun to erode, especially among younger Cuban-Americans.

Cubans were also just the first wave a large immigration boom, mostly from Latin America and the Caribbean that has and is still changing the region. This new wave of immigrants has made South Florida more politically and ethnically diverse.

Central Florida has also undergone a relatively recent and dramatic transformation due to growth. In 1971, the region's rural landscape, dotted with cattle ranches, gave way to the Walt Disney World resort behemoth. In intervening years, resorts, theme parks, condominiums and golf courses were built at a blistering rate, drawing both professionals and service industry employees to the area in large numbers.

The area has seen so much growth that "it is becoming its own megalopolis -- a 'Tamplando' or 'Orlampa," wrote Michael Barone in the Almanac of American Politics.

The region's population centers, clustered around Interstate 4 -- which bisects the state from Daytona Beach to Tampa -- are inhabited by the most dense concentration of the state's coveted "swing voters."

These voters' "swing" tendency is determined by their middle class economic status and diverse backgrounds. Worker-attracting industries now range from tourism to agriculture to high tech. Rural farming communities, ramshackle trailer parks, suburban subdivisions and upscale resorts dot the landscape.

The Orlando Sentinel has called the area "a region in name only, where job growth has brought an assorted population of 4.6 million people not united by jobs, family, background, or beliefs."

While groups of voters in the rest of the state are widely considered to have already committed to one candidate, the Floridians living along I-4 seem to be an amazingly malleable group.

Its voters' apparently open minds have also made the I-4 corridor some of the most targeted political territory in the country. When national candidates show up in the Sunshine State, they're usually a stone's throw from the Interstate. The 2004 presidential campaigns have also bombarded the region with millions of dollars' worth of ads.

In recent years the growth and diversity of Central and South Florida has started to spill into the northern part of the state. Panhandle cities like Panama City Beach have reinvented themselves as spring break destinations. Retirement communities are beginning to spring up in North Central Florida areas that are predominantly rural and Southern in culture.

Experts say, however, that this growth has not rapidly changed general voting trends outside the I-4 corridor. In fact, except for Central Florida's voters, who could go in either direction at the polls in November, the rest of the state is considered a virtual deadlock when it comes to national politics. Republicans do well in the Northeast and panhandle regions, while Democrats do well among non-Cuban South Floridians.

This balance has been demonstrated in recent statewide elections. The 2000 presidential election ended in a near tie. Jeb Bush has been elected to two terms, but both of the state's U.S. senators are Democrats.

The almost evenly split electorate will again test the state's notorious voting system when citizens go to the polls in November 2004. The presidential race and a U.S. Senate contest are expected to draw large numbers of voters. Reforms put into place after the 2000 election seem to have some effect. Only scattered, minor problems were reported during the 2004 primary election. But state officials and observers have warned of potential problems related to the aftermath of two major hurricanes that ripped through the state in mid-August and early September.

-- Compiled for the Online NewsHour by Jason Manning