[xsl] Start and end an anchor tag in 2 different if's?

["Hardy Merrill" <HMerrill@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Given this snippet from an XSL style sheet:
----------------------------------------------------------

	<xsl:if test="district_active='1'">
		<a>
			<xsl:attribute name="href">LegislatorEdit.asp
				?lid=<xsl:value-of
select="legislator_id" />
				&amp;lstat=<xsl:value-of select="$lstat"
/>
				&amp;dtype=<xsl:value-of select="$dtype"
/>
				&amp;dno=<xsl:value-of select="$dno" />
			</xsl:attribute>
	</xsl:if>
				
	<xsl:choose>
		<xsl:when test="substring(full_name,1,6) = 'Vacant'">
			<xsl:value-of select="'Vacant'" />
		</xsl:when>
		<xsl:otherwise>
			<xsl:value-of select="full_name" />
		</xsl:otherwise>
	</xsl:choose>
						
	<xsl:if test="district_active='1'">
		</a>   <!--============ Notice this ==============-->
	</xsl:if>

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can't the first if-test start an <A> tag, and the 2nd if-test end it
with </A>?  I want to start the anchor, then fill in the display text
based on a choose, and then end the anchor.

When I try this I get this error

msxml4.dll error '80004005' 
The stylesheet does not contain a document element. The stylesheet may
be empty, or it may not be a well-formed XML document. 

Is there something obvious that I'm doing wrong?

TIA.

Hardy Merrill