Here we are, almost two weeks after the election, and we still don’t have the final counts in some races. I guess its just modern technology. When I will a kid living in a small country town in the orange country of California, it worked like this.
Each precinct had about 800 to 1000 voters. There was an election board in each precinct made up of half Democrats and Half Republicans. You went into a little booth (cloth covered) and voted with a pen on printed ballots. When you came out, you handed the ballot to an inspector who placed it in a locked box with a slit on top.
Every so often someone (one of the board) came out and mark off on a list hanging outside the polling place those who had voted so far. (So poll watchers could know who voted and start working on those who hadn’t.)
When the polls closed, the board opened the locked box and counted the ballots. The Democrats kept an eye on the Republicans and vice versa. There was virtually no cheating going on. When the results were tallied, they were called in to the county, and then from there to the state.
Usually this was completed by 2AM, 4AM at the latest. Polls usually closed at 7 PM.
That was it. The ballots were placed back in the locked box and the next morning picked up and taken to headquarters where they were held if a recount was needed.
The only “Mail in ballots” were those for folks who where sick or out of town. You had to apply for those (Called absentee ballots) in advance. When they arrived at election headquarters those voters were marked off on the individual precinct’s voter list and those ballots were placed in the locked box taken out to the individual precincts and then counted with the other ballots. (I’m not sure about this, maybe they were counted at election headquarters and added on the totals as they came in.)
The precincts were in schools, libraries, fire stations and dare I say it private homes. In fact, our precinct was in the home next door and the homeowner served breakfast, lunch and a light dinner to those who came to vote. She was a great cook.
I know folks want to make it easy to vote, opening polls a month before election day and accepting mail in ballots. That is of some concern to me. What if we find that one candidate or another is an ax murderer a week before the election, but half the people have already voted. An ax murderer could easily have been elected. I guess that’s a shrug of the shoulders and a resounding “Oh Well.”
Usually the only places that election fraud occurred were places that had only one party or another on the election boards. Happened. I’m a tad concerned about computerized voting. The guy who writes the program controls the election. If you don’t believe me, ask a person who writes code.
Just sayin
JVH
