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The importance of elections was declared by President Calvin Coolidge, April 19, 1926: “The whole system of American Government rests on the ballot box.”
First, some background.
The most common form of government in world history is kings. Their subjects did choose their leaders. They did not vote.
The first well-recorded instance of millions of people living without a king was Ancient Israel’s Republic, circa 1,400 to 1,000 B.C. It was that initial four hundred year period after they left Egypt and entered the Promised Land, before King Saul.
The Bible does not give the details, but each tribe chose their own city elders, as Moses stated in Deuteronomy 1:3–13 “Take you wise men, and understanding, and known among your tribes”;
and Deuteronomy 16:18–19 “Judges and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates which the Lord thy God giveth thee throughout thy tribes”;
and Exodus 18:21 “Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens.”
Since the idea was to choose the individuals that God wanted, one method of selection was “by lot.” Proverbs 16:33 “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.”
The Greek word for “lot” is “kleros,” from which the words clergy, cleric, and clerk come from – individuals chosen to do the work of the Lord, as Zechariah, John the Baptist’s father, was chosen by lot for his service in the Temple.
“Kleros” were actually pieces of wood used for casting lots.
Pieces of wood were used for determining which tribe God had chosen to minister in Tabernacle, as recorded in Numbers chapter 17. The head of each tribe placed a piece of wood, a rod, before the Ark of the Covenant. The next day, Aaron’s rod budded, revealing God had chosen the Tribe of Levi.
Deciding offices by casting lots is where the word “allotment” comes from, as in the random selection process for picking jurors from a jury pool.
The Promised Land was divided by lot among the Tribes of Israel.
When Jonah was running away from God and the sailors cast lots to see for whose fault the storm was sent.
Roman soldiers cast lots for Jesus’ robe.
Acts 1:26 described how the apostles “drew lots” to determine who God wanted to replace Judas.”
In Ancient Athens, 480-323 B.C., instead of casting lots, each Greek citizen placed a pebble in one of two urns to indicate who was chosen. The Greek word for pebble was psēphos – pronounced “say fos,” from which comes our word “vote.”
The study of voting is called “psephology.”
Pebbles were replaced marking a name on a small broken piece of pottery. These pieces were sorted into piles.
Romans, instead us using pebbles, used marbles or little clay balls, which voters dropped into boxes. The word for little ball in Italian is “ballota,” in France ballotte, from which comes our word “ballot.”
Ancient India, around 920 A.D., used the Kudavolai system, where villagers wrote a candidate’s name on palm leaves which were put inside a mud pot.
In Russia’s Republic of Novgorod, 12th through the 15 centuries, citizens gathered in the city square and voted by shouting for their candidate.
The first use of paper ballots in America was in church. The Massachusetts Bay Colony used paper ballots in 1629 to select a pastor for the Salem Church.
Reverend Thomas Hooker, who founded Hartford, Connecticut, stated in a sermon in 1638: “The privilege of election … belongs to the people according to the blessed will and law of God.”
Since the goal was to follow God’s will, instead simply casting lots, church members fasted and prayed, then cast their ballots, thus they would be participating in having God’s will be done.
The belief was that God had preordained someone to be their pastor and they were simply to recognize the one God had chosen. Being chosen by God was called being “the elect.”
1 Peter 1:1-2 stated: “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces.”
Paul wrote in Colossians 3:12 “Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies”; and in 2 Timothy 2:10: “I endure all things for the elect’s sakes.”
Mark 13:20 described the last days: “And except that the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh should be saved: but for the elect’s sake, whom he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days.”
The process of putting down the name of God’s “elect” was called an “election.”
President Calvin Coolidge explained how the idea of voting in American came from congregational churches:
“The great apostle of this movement was the Reverend John Wise, of Massachusetts … writing in 1710 … ‘Democracy is Christ’s government in church and state.’ Here was the doctrine of equality, popular sovereignty … just as we have the principle of the consent of the governed stated by Reverend Thomas Hooker as early as 1638 …”
Coolidge continued:
“Placing every man on a plane where he acknowledged no superiors, where no one possessed any right to rule over him, he must inevitably choose his own rulers through a system of self-government … In those days such doctrines would scarcely have been permitted to flourish and spread in any other country.”
Coolidge stated April 19, 1926:
“Election day in the olden times was generally considered more or less sacred – one to be devoted to the discharge of the obligations of citizenship.”
Coolidge added, November 3, 1924:
“I therefore urge upon all the voters of our country … that they assemble tomorrow at their respective voting places in the exercise of the high office of American citizenship, that they approach the ballot box in the spirit that they would approach a sacrament, and there … make their choice of public officers solely in the light of their own conscience. When an election is so held, when a choice is so made, it … sustains the belief that the voice of the people is the voice of God.”
The U.S. Constitution mentions the word “ballot” 3 times, the words “vote,” “votes,” “voted,” 15 times, and the words “elect,” “elected,” “election,” “electors,” 18 times, but nowhere does the Constitution does it give instructions on how to have an honest election.
Article I, Section 4, Clause 1 leaves the election process under the jurisdiction of each state:
“The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof.”
This was an important feature in the new Republic, as the memory was still fresh of the King’s overbearing centralized government.
States arranged elections where citizens voted for local officials, state-wide officials, Congressmen, and presidential electors. Presidential electors from all the states elected the President.
State legislatures elected U.S. Senators up until1913 when the 17th Amendment changed electing Senators into a state-side popular vote, a kind of super Congressman. This changed the purpose of Senators from keeping the federal government small to letting the federal government get big, with Senators often funneling money and favors back to their contributors.
Many states simply had voice votes called “viva voce,” similar to voice votes of “ayes” and “nays” in committee meetings run by Robert’s Rules of Order.
In these states, citizens gathered at the courthouse in a festive or carnival atmosphere. The clerk or judge would have citizens swear on a Bible as to who they were, then state their name and call out who they were voting for. Voice voting was used in states like Kentucky as late as 1891.
In other state elections, individuals scrawled the names of their candidates on pieces of paper and drop them in a ballot box. Museums have collections of colorfully decorated ballots from the early 1800s.
If a group wanted to create a new political party, all they had to do was write down their views, called a platform, and then have candidates run on that platform.
Political parties began to print the names of their candidates on colorful pieces of paper, called “party tickets,” and hand them out, similar to groups today printing voter guides. Voters proudly displayed these colored party ballots in their coat or vest pockets on the way to the polling place to let everyone know how they were going to vote.
They would enter the polling place and simply put their “party ticket” into the ballot box.
Newspapers printed races and candidates, which some simply tore out and dropped in the ballot box.
In some instances, people would sign their names to their ballots, as there was no motivation to have a “secret ballot.”
But there was cheating, like when a man with a full beard voted, then went home, shaved his beard, came back pretending to be someone else and voted again.
Then there was the Civil War. Soldiers away from home filled out absentee ballots and handed them to their superior officer who had them delivered to the soldiers’ home counties.
Immediately instances of delays and ballot tampering in delivering the ballots.
Republican President Abraham Lincoln led the Union in ending slavery, freeing four million slaves. The period after the Civil War was called Reconstruction, where Union troops were left in the Democrat South to protect the freed slaves and guarantee their rights, especially their right to vote.
Many blacks were elected, all of whom ran as Republicans. Democrat-affiliated vigilante groups in the South began intimidating Blacks from voting. These groups committed acts of violence and terrorism similar to modern-day Antifa and BLM groups.
One of the Democrat-affiliated vigilante groups was the Klu Klux Clan, headed up by former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forest – the first Grand Wizard of the K.K.K. They attacked Blacks, as well as white Northerners were in the South to register Blacks to vote.
Tuskegee Institute recorded that between 1882-1968, there were at least 4,743 documented lynchings, being 3,446 blacks and 1,297 whites, who were called “extremists” or “radical” Republicans for registering blacks to vote.
Senator Robert Byrd, the longest serving Democrat Senator, was a former Klansman. He admitted: “You had to be in the Klan to advance in the Democrat Party.”
Republicans in Congress pushed through the 15thAmendment in 1870 prohibiting Southern Democrat states from racially discriminating against Blacks in elections.
Republican President Ulysses S. Grant addressed Congress, December 5, 1870:
“I would sum up the policy of the Administration … finally, in securing a pure, untrammeled ballot, where every man entitled to cast a vote may do so, just once at each election, without fear of molestation or proscription on account of his political faith, nativity, or color.”
Due to Democrat voter intimidation, Republicans pushed through the Klu Klux Klan Act of 1871, also called the Enforcement Act, to enforce rights for African Americans:
“Be it enacted … That any person who, under … any State, shall subject … by force, intimidation, or threat … to prevent any citizen of the United States lawfully entitled to vote from giving his support or advocacy in a lawful manner towards or in favor of the election, … every person so offending shall be deemed guilty of a high crime.”
It is of note that the efforts in several states to keep President Trump’s name off of ballots, and prevent citizens from voting for him, is in violation of the Klu Klux Kaln Act of 1871, which states in Section 2:
“If two or more persons within any State … prevent any person from accepting or holding any office or trust or place of confidence under the United States … or threat to prevent any citizen of the United States lawfully entitled to vote from giving his support or advocacy in a lawful manner towards or in favor of the election … or to injure any such citizen in his person or property on account of such support or advocacy, each and every person so offending shall be deemed guilty of a high crime …
Such facts shall be deemed a denial by such State of the equal protection of the laws to which they are entitled under the Constitution of the United States.”
It was only after the Civil War and after the Reconstruction Era that a push began for secret ballots, so voters would not be subject retaliation.
In the 1850’s Australia made an election innovation. Rather than individuals carrying their ballots with them to the polling place, the polling place would have pre-printed ballots with all the candidates names on them. The voter just had to do mark which name they wanted.
New York Evening Post editor Philip Loring Allen wrote in 1906: “It is the most potent of all sheets of paper: the ballot.”
With various printed ballot styles there was a potential for confusion and fraud, so states passed election laws specifying the dimensions of pre-printed ballots, even the thickness of the paper.
By 1888, states, with cooperation from the major political parties, enacted deadlines and requirements for getting a candidate’s name on the ballot. This made it more difficult for outside candidates and new political parties.
An innovation in 1884, was the glass ballot jar with a lockable wooden housing. The thought was if people could see inside, it would make it more difficult for cheater to add or remove ballots without it being noticed.
Corrupt political operatives had their tactics. President Theodore Roosevelt decried January 31, 1908:
“Corrupt business and corrupt politics act and react with ever increasing debasement, one on the other … the blackmailing ward boss, the ballot-box stuffer … the mob leader, the hired bully … all work at the same web of corruption.”
To prevent this was new technology. A ballot box would have an internal cylinder “roller” to ensure that once a ballot was dropped in it could not be seen or tampered with, similar to a night deposit draw at a bank.
One infamous ballot-stuffing incident was Lyndon Johnson’s 1948 Democrat Senate primary election. Johnson lost, but on election night, in the south Texas town of Alice in Jim Wells County, it was announced they found an uncounted box of ballots in Precinct 13.
A week of chaos ensued. Finally, the newly recounted ballots showed 202 additional voters, some of whom were buried in the local cemetery or absent on election day. These voters had “lined up” in alphabetical order, signed in the same blue ink, in the same handwriting, and all cast their ballots for LBJ.
The New York Times published an article July 30, 1977, titled “Ex-Official Says He Stole 1948 Election for Johnson”:
“Johnson did not win that election – it was stolen for him … said Mr. Salas, now a lean, white-haired 76 year old … He decided to break his silence in quest for ‘peace of mind’ … ‘I was just going along with my party’ … Mr. Parr ordered that 200-odd votes be added to Mr. Johnson’s total from Box 13 … Parr was the Godfather.”
Complex gear-and-lever voting machines were introduced in the late 1800s in hopes that the new technology would prevent fraud.
In 1910, Jacob H. Myers invented an “automatic voting booth,” weighing hundreds of pounds and having more moving parts than an automobile. Some had over 200 levers, with one for each candidate. The voter pulled a lever for each candidate or pull one big lever to vote straight party. When they pulled back the curtain to exit the booth, it flipped a switch which then complied their votes and reset the machine for the next voter.
Unfortunately, the machines were susceptible to error, as a single damaged tooth on one gear could cause miscounts, or they could be rigged with something as small as the tip of a graphite pencil.
Various states began using these mechanical voting machines from the early 1900s till the 1960s. They were replaced with optical scan ballots, where a voter filled in little circles on a ballot and then fed the ballot into a computer reader.
Then were introduced rectangular IBM computer punch cards, which gained public trust because it was new technology, but these cards were susceptible to miscounts as tiny pieces of card from the punched holes caused errors, such as from “hanging chad,” “dimpled chad,” and “pregnant chad.”
In 2002, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act, which introduced electronic voting with touch screens. This gained public trust as it was new technology. Unfortunately, software glitches, unsecure code, remote access, and hacking vulnerabilities have resulted in errors, malfunctions and loss of public confidence in voting machine companies owned by private individuals.
One of the largest is ES&S – Election Systems and Software, which is owned by the privately-held McCarthy Group. Another is Dominion Voting Systems, which is owned by the private equity firm, Staple Street Capital.
The Atlantic Journal-Constitution reported June 3, 2022:
“A U.S. cybersecurity agency reported Friday that voting touchscreens used in Georgia have security vulnerabilities that put them at risk to hacking attacks.”
As a result, a movement is beginning to return to paper ballots and same day voting with voters show ID that they are citizens.
A news report, November 22, 2023, had the headline “Why can Argentina count 25-30 million paper ballots in hours, while blue U.S. swing states take DAYS with machines?”
In closing, we do well to remember President Coolidge’s advice, November 3, 1924:
“… approach the ballot box in the spirit that they would approach a sacrament … When an election is so held … it … sustains the belief that the voice of the people is the voice of God.”
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This post originally appeared at https://americanminute.com/blogs/todays-american-minute/election-history-american-minute-with-bill-federer