Voting is central to American democracy, yet the Constitution of the United States doesn’t outline exactly how people should vote in elections. Instead, Article 1, section 4 leaves it up to each State to determine “the times, places, and procedures for holding elections”. Over 200 years’ evolution in voting technologies from outdoor “voice votes” to digital consoles with touch screens has changed voting mechanics dramatically.
Voter Notification
In the early decades of American elections, most voting was not done privately or using ballots – rather eligible voters (typically white men at that time) went directly to courthouses to cast their vote publicly in front of witnesses.
Oral vote by voice was common practice across most states in the early 19th century; Kentucky upheld it up until 1891. When voters arrived at their courthouse, a judge would swear them in on an open Bible and confirm whether or not they had already cast ballots before swearing them in. Once confirmed by this official process, electors would announce their choice candidates by shouting to their clerk and shouting their names out loud to announce who had won each race in which they voted for.
Campaigning and petting were permitted at polling stations; drunken carnival atmosphere often pervaded early elections in the US; this may explain why turnout reached 84% with voice voting elections.
First paper ballots
Paper ballots first made an appearance during the early 19th century; however, these weren’t issued or produced by government election officials; voters would simply write their candidates names onto pieces of paper that could then be dropped into ballot boxes. Newspapers soon started publishing blank ballots titled for every polling station to which readers could tear and fill with their candidates of choice.
Political parties soon emerged; around the middle of the 19th century, representatives from either the Republican or Democratic Parties of a state distributed preprinted pamphlets that only listed candidates from their party running in elections – often called Republican or Democratic “tickets”, due to looking like train tickets from earlier in history. Party supporters could legally use such preprinted tickets as ballots enabling easier party supporter voting directly along party lines than ever.
WATCH: Voting Tech
In Australia’s late 19th-century electoral politics were marked by partisan ballots which often caused accusations of electoral fraud and reform efforts to take place; as an answer Australia introduced their first official paper ballot printed by their government in 1858 – thus providing electoral legitimacy with paper voting technology solutions.
Australian ballot papers – comprising printed lists with all candidates’ names on them that voters could receive at the polling station – were first used by New York and Massachusetts states in 1888, before spreading throughout other US states such as Ohio.
At the close of the 19th century, Jacob H. Myers created his revolutionary automated lever voting machine – an engineering marvel which would rule American elections from 1910 until 1980.
Douglas Jones, professor of computer science at the University of Iowa, studied voting machines during their history. His study concluded that Myers’ revolutionary machine featured more moving parts than any other device of its time including cars; early voting machines typically weighed hundreds of pounds, cost thousands in costs, and would remain installed near town halls for decades at a time.
Voting on these lever machines was straightforward: candidates in every race had their name next to a lever which Americans could manipulate by lowering it for those they desired, or pull another lever which automatically selected either Republican or Democratic candidates for them.
Hand pushing lever in voting booth. Image not dated.
Jones recounted how inside this machine, the counting process was extraordinarily complex: there were 200 or so levers on its front to control voting until all voting mechanisms had been pulled on a given lever (in case an elector changes their mind) while each party right lever needed to link with every candidate lever on a ticket – none required one watt of electricity!
“Muscle power was all it required to move the small levers that allow voters to cast ballots for candidates, then more muscle power to operate the large, large lever that opened and closed the curtain,” stated Jones.
Unbeknownst to most voters, opening the curtain of their voting booth ultimately counts their votes and resets it for another voter.
Jones claims these machines inspired great public trust due to their physical nature; Myers Automatic Voting Machines held approximately 80% market share at that point in time. “However, behind-the-scenes it may not have been justified”.
Lever machines were mechanical devices and it was common for missing teeth on gears to cause serious miscalculations that often went undetected by election officials. According to Jones, this meant machines could easily be compromised using something as simple as graphite pencil tip rigging.
Punch cards and “Hanging Chads”
Punch card voting systems first gained widespread adoption during the 1960s when companies like IBM presented them as the future of computing. According to Jones, one key innovation of punched cards was being counted instantly on election night through computers which then produced instant vote tallies that we now take for granted.
But these systems had their downsides as was witnessed during Florida’s recount in 2000 for President of United States presidential election, when voters first became familiar with new terminology like “dimple chads”, “pregnant chads” and “hanging chads”.
A “chad” is the small rectangle of paper produced when voters use punch cards to select ballot options, with potential issues occurring when this chad remains attached or partially depressed (known as suspended or pregnant chads).
Election officials had to inspect each ballot by hand in Florida during its extended recounts to decide whether any hanging or blistered chads should be counted or disregarded.
Voters use electronic voting machines at the Congregational Church in Laguna Beach, California on November 6, 2018 for midterm elections.
Robyn Beck of Getty Images.
Vote by “iPad”
Following the recount in Florida, Congress approved the Help America Vote Act of 2002 which mandates higher standards for voting equipment used during federal elections.
“The Help America Vote Act assumed touchscreen voting machines would become the future of voting,” notes Jones, “and there was an early 2000s surge of adoption of these voting systems before there was a noticeable backlash against them. ”
Though states and municipalities spent millions upgrading their voting equipment, not all touchscreen voting machines were equal, according to Jones; software problems led to discrepancies when tallying voters’ count results; during 2016 presidential election season alone electronic voting machines in 21 states were targeted by Russian hackers attempting to compromise them.
After seeing these trends unfold in several states, several opted to replace costly touchscreen voting machines with paper ballots instead.
Voting Machines as Scantrons
Shortly after punch card voting machines became widely popular during the 1960s, optical scanning machines (OSM) began becoming available. According to Jones, these voting devices were heavily inspired by forms used for automatically classifying standardized exams and was inspired by this.
Since there have been concerns over pirated voting machines and more states are encouraging advance balloting by mail, optical scanning technology is quickly becoming the go-to voting method in America. Fillable ballots can easily be sent directly to voters via the mail; thus reducing volunteer requirements at polling stations while significantly expanding voting hours beyond polling day itself.
Optometric scanning technology is relatively affordable and doesn’t involve Chad.
