BALLOT ( °little ball))) : essentially, a se cret as distinguished from an open vote, to se cure the voter from previous intimidation or subsequent revenge. Recent methods of ballot reform, therefore, are only devices to obtain the result inherent in its very nature, a non secret ballot being a contradiction in terms and the same as viva voce voting. The various forms of ballot reduce to two in essence: bal lots themselves indicating choice,—as colored balls, printed tickets or mechanical devices showing names,—and depositories indicating the choice. The former is universal in modem times and most general in ancient.
History.— The ballot must be nearly as old as the practice of voting by unprotected bodies of citizens; but our first knowledge of it is in classic Greece, where the dikasts (popular courts and juries) voted °yes)) or °no)) by balls of stone or metal (white or unpierced meaning acquittal, black or pierced indicating condem nation), by marked shells (ostrakoi, whence °ostracism') or banishment of an unpopular leader), or by olive leaves Opetalism3). In the assemblies the conunon voting was by show of hands, to secure public responsibility; in cases of privilege or ostracism it was by ballot In Rome the first ballot law (though far from the first balloting) was the Gabinian, 139 a.c., and the machinery is very modern: tabelle, or tickets, with candidates' names, or °yes° and °no° ballots for changes in the laws; boxes, in spectors and check-lists; but in case of a tie the candidates drew lots. In the medimval republics the ballot was a regular machinery; but it has been bitterly fought and slow of in troduction in all non-republican countries, the governments and the privileged classes being loath to weaken their power of dragooning their officials or the lower classes into obedience. In Scotland it was used in 1662 under the name of °billeting,'" to banish political opponents (os tracism); but the English government disal lowed the act. In England it was first put for ward to protect members of Parliament ag-ainst government revenge for voting against its bills, not the electors against the classes which fur nished the members of Parliament; in 1710 the House of Commons passed a ballot law, but the Lords threw it out In the modern world the American colonies of England were by far the first to make the ballot (voting °by papers))) the foundation of the government system; they used it from the first, and it was made obligatory in several of the State Constitutions adopted in 1776. New
York, with its great landed aristocracy, was slower, using it only for the governor and lieutenant-governor in 1778, a.nd not extending it to the legislature till 1787. The Southern States held to the viva voce system for many years after, and Kentucky till 1891, its Constitu tion providing for it, though the United States statutes compelled it to use written or printed ballots for Congressional elections. All the State Constitutions now provide for elections by ballot.
In Great Britain it was not only fought by the privileged classes as overthrowing their leadership of the tenants and artisans, but by a large part even of the Liberals as undermining the manliness of the English character. The vanguard of the movement were the Bentha mites, and it stood foremost in the program of reform put forward by the more radical Whigs early in the 19th century. It was in the first draft of the Reform Bill of 1832; in 1833 Grote the historian introduced it, and re peated the attempt every year till 1839 with a fresh speech of immense force and learning. It was supported by Macaulay with his usual effectiveness, but was sneered at by so good a Liberal as Sydney Smith, and heartily sup ported by none but the Chartists, whose support alone would have killed it. They made' it one of the "six points" of their "People's Charter.* In 1851 it was carried in the Commons by 51 majority against Lord John Russell and his Liberal government, but went no further. In 1869 it was tried at Manchester as a test, and worked well; was adopted at school-board elec tions in 1870; and the same year a select com mittee of the House, headed by Lord Harting ton, reported in its favor as a means of lessen ing corruption, ((treating,* and intimidation. In 1872 Mr. W. E. Forger's Ballot Act made printed ballots compulsory at all national and municipal elections except those of university candidates for Parliament. This put an end to the drunken riots attending the previous public nominations at the hustings, so keenly satirized by Dickens and others.