Vote recording

Abstract

An electronic voting machine includes a number of terminals to facilitate accommodating virtually any ballot with nearly the minimum amount of apparatus for the particular ballot. A display lists the candidates for each office beside an identifying tag. A poll worker actuates a switch which enables the apparatus to receive vote selection indicated on a keyboard by the voter. The voter operates a switch to identify the office or issue being voted and then enters his choice on a keyboard to cause a signal representative of his selection to enter a temporary storage means and be illuminated on a display means. The voter turns a switch to the office or issue voted upon, enters a number representative of the candidate or issue decision selected and sees his vote displayed as it enters storage. A circuit arrangement prevents more than a predetermined number of votes for an office from entering storage and indicates an invalid vote on the display when the voter tries to cast more than the authorized number of votes for a particular office or issue. The voter may also indicate his desire to write in for a particular office by entering his choice on a keyboard and operating a switch to identify the choice as a write-in, whereby a signal indicating that a write-in vote is being cast for that office enters temporary storage. If the write-in is valid, the voter may write in his vote for a particular office, and the write-in vote cannot be seen by others until voting is completed and all write-in votes counted. Upon completing his voting, the voter actuates an enter switch that causes transfer of his votes in temporary storage into an appropriate accumulator, such as a computer.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.