Voting machine is a mechanical device or computerized system for recording and counting votes. Voters in the United States and other countries use voting machines when choosing candidates for government office. They also use such machines when voting on various issues, such as proposals to raise property taxes or issue municipal bonds. Some voting machines, called legislative voting machines, record votes in a number of lawmaking bodies, including the United States House of Representatives and many state legislatures. This article discusses voting machines used in elections.
Lever machines were the earliest voting machines used in elections. Voters first used them in a Lockport, New York, election in 1892. To use a lever machine, the voter moves a master lever that closes a set of curtains around the voter and unlocks the voting machine. In front of the voter are the names of all the candidates, arranged in rows according to the office they are seeking and their political party. The voter turns a pointer next to the name of each candidate he or she chooses. After selecting the candidates, the voter pulls the master lever back to the starting position, and the votes are recorded in the machine. Manufacture and distribution of lever machines continued steadily through the mid-1900’s.
Computerized voting systems began to replace lever machines in the late 1900’s. By the 1990’s, they had become the most popular method of voting in the United States and many other countries. There are three main categories of computerized voting systems: (1) direct-recording electronic (DRE) systems, (2) punch-card systems, and (3) optically scanned paper ballots. DRE technology is similar to the lever machine. But instead of pulling a lever, the voter makes selections by pushing a button or by touching boxes on a computer screen. The votes are counted electronically, not mechanically.
With punch-card systems, the voter punches a hole in a computer card. The piece of paper that is punched out of the card is called a chad. The punch cards are fed into a card reader, and a computer totals all valid votes for each candidate. With optically scanned paper ballots, voters make choices by filling ovals or boxes with a pencil or by drawing arrows to the candidates’ names. A computer then scans the ballot and records the votes.
Properly designed voting machines provide a fast, accurate, impartial, and secret count of election results. Machines with effective safeguards make it difficult to tamper with ballots or “stuff” a ballot box with illegal ballots. Well-designed systems can also reduce the likelihood of overvotes and undervotes. An overvote results from a voter accidentally voting for too many candidates for an office. An undervote occurs when no vote is recorded. This can occur when a ballot is improperly marked or misread.
Confusing ballot layouts and technical problems can lead to many overvotes and undervotes. Many punch-card systems may not properly count votes if the chads have not been fully punched out of the cards. Debates about partially punched chads and complaints about confusing ballot layouts were largely responsible for a delay in declaring the winner of the U.S. presidential election of 2000. Studies concluded that voter errors in marking ballots and flawed technologies for reading marked ballots led to an undercount of at least 2 million votes in the 2000 election. See United States presidential election of 2000.
In 2002, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), and President George W. Bush signed it into law. HAVA provided funding for the elimination of punch-card and lever voting systems. HAVA also established minimum standards for election administration and established the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Today, nearly all jurisdictions use either DRE or optical-scanning methods.
