Electronic voting machine with cathode ray tube display

Abstract

A voting machine system employs a processor section and a plurality of peripheral units, all interconnected by a two-way street or bus system. The peripheral units constitute the voting machine proper and the processor or section acts upon the data generated by the peripheral units. One of the peripheral units is a visual display whereas the ballot format upon which a voter may vote is displayed. This ballot format is called up and displayed in response to unique input provided by the voter and different ballot formats are stored for call-up. Vote selections are made by the voter from the display. Provision is made for voter write-in selections which are stored in machine-readable, i.e., digital form. Two other peripheral units are redundant recording devices, one of which remains with the machine for a permanent record and the other of which is removable to permit forwarding thereof to a central data accumulation center. The removable record is used to program the machine and contains all of the permissable ballot formats. During set-up, the program and information on the removable record is read into the machine and is transferred to the permanent record. Vote selections as well as other data are recorded and a verification display for the voter is read from the record.