Rensselaer Republican, Volume 28, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 December 1896 — VOTING BY MACHINERY. [ARTICLE]

VOTING BY MACHINERY.

Amendments to the Constitution for it Will Surely Pass This Winter. It is, not unlikely that Within five or six years Indiana will be voting by machinery. It was gen-erally-supposed that the joint res-, olution contemplating a constitutional amendment m order that, this might be done had failed to pass the senate alt the last session and had thus died. This is not the case however. The joint resolution upon one vote failed tb pass for the lack of a constitutional majority, but it was brought up again dnring the crush of the last few hours and passed and the record shows that it passed the senate. This resolution must bepaesed again in tlje regular way by both houses of the legislature and then submitted tp voters. It

seems entirely likely that the resolution will go through the* legislature thia winter, and if it does there is no question but that it will Be ratified by the voters. The machine method absolutely prevents .the, possibility of corrupt voting, for there is no possible means by which the voter could carry frorn the polling booth any evidence whatever as to how he had voted. Secrecy would be absolute, there would be no time spent in the count and no mistakes could be made in the count, for the votes are counted automatically as soon as the last one is cast. There would be no possibility of spoiling ballots. The veter, entering, would find on the face of the machine the tickets of of £he various parties, as they are now printed on the blanket ballot with a key opposite each name and a key opposite each party emblem. By pressing “the key opposite the emblem his vote would be counted for all the names on that ticket and he could vote a scratched ticket by pressing the key* opposite the individual names? of the man for whom he desired to vote. Having pressed a key once all further pressing he might do upon it would not record anything until his passage through the door giving him an exit from the booth again threw the- machine in shape for further voting. The Miers machine, the one best known, was put in the state of Washington at a cost of S4BO to the precinct, but there are other machines just as good, one or two by Indiana inventors, and they can be put in at a cost of S3OO to the precinct. This would make the expense about $10,500 to the county. It would save on each election over S9OO in the hire of election boards, even assuming that there would be as many men on the boards, as now, and an equal amount in the bills for printing, stamps, paper and pads.