Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean was the winner in a first-ever online primary race held by progressive activist group Moveon.org. The virtual vote pitted the nine announced candidates for the Democratic Party nomination against each other for the support of the liberal-leaning organization, which claims 1.4 million members.

Moveon.org, co-founded by former software industry executive Wes Boyd, was launched in 1998 as a modest online petition drive opposing the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, but gained greater notoriety for organizing opposition to the Iraq war. The organization initially planned to hold the voting on Tuesday and Wednesday, but held the primary over until 1:15 a.m. on Thursday as a flood of votes caused technical glitches on the site's server.

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No candidate won a majority of votes, and with it the prize of an official endorsement by the organization's political action committee. But Dean got the most votes - 43.87 percent of the 317,639 votes cast (more than the number of votes tallied in the 2000 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary and the Iowa and South Carolina Democratic presidential caucuses, combined, according to the group's Web site).

Following Dean's 139,360 votes, were Dennis Kucinich with 23.93 percent (76,000 votes); John Kerry with 15.73 percent (49,973 votes), John Edwards, 3.19 percent (10,146 votes); Richard Gephardt, 2.44 percent (7,755 votes); Bob Graham, 2.24 percent (7,113 votes); Carol Moseley Braun, 2.21 percent (7,021 votes); Joe Lieberman, 1.92 percent (6,095 votes); and Al Sharpton, 0.53 percent (1,677 votes).

Before the voting, some candidates' campaigns had complained that the voting was stacked against them, after the organization allowed some of the candidates; Dean, Kucinich and Kerry, to send emails to Moveon members requesting their support. The primary is not binding on the Democratic Party, but the candidates have taken it seriously, given its access to a core of potentially active grass-roots supporters, contributors and voters who could be crucial to the winning Democratic candidate in 2004.

Before the primary, each of the candidates wrote a letter to the MoveOn membership and responded to interview questions.

In addition to the votes cast, more than 54,000 participants pledged to volunteer for the candidate of their choice and more than 77 percent authorized the Moveon PAC to give their email address to the candidate of their choice, according to the organization.

The left-leaning group has become a key voice for liberal Democratic politics, having organized massive email campaigns and rallies across the country in opposition to the Iraq war, in addition to raising an estimated $3.2 million for congressional candidates in 2000 and $4.1 million for candidates in 2002, according to Boyd.

Even without the formal endorsement, political analysts have said that Dean's victory in the primary will help him make the case that he is the preferred choice of the party's liberal base, the most activist part of the party. Centrist and more conservative candidates like Gephardt, Kerry and particularly Lieberman, did poorly in the Moveon primary.