Ballot tallying system including a digital programmable read only control memory, a digital ballot image memory and a digital totals memory

• US 4,021,780 A
• Filed: 09/24/1975
• Issued: 05/03/1977
• Est. Priority Date: 09/24/1975
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Airmac Technology Systems, Inc.
• Original Assignee: James O. Narey, William H. Saylor
• Inventors: Narey, James O., Saylor, William H.
• Primary Examiner(s): Chapnick, Melvin B.
• Application Number:
  US05/616,328
• Time in Patent Office: 587 Days
• Field of Search: 340/172.5, 235/54 F, 235/61.9 R, 235/92 AC
• US Class Current: 235/54.00F
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 13/00 Voting apparatus

Abstract

Ballot receiving, storing, and tallying system, capable of reading individual ballots and of delivering a printed record showing the subtotals of votes cast for the various candidates, propositions, and the like, and incorporating solid-state logic circuits for carrying out various functions of the system. The system includes a digital programmable read-only control memory for storing a group of instruction words representing possible vote marking positions on ballot formats interpreted by the system; a digital ballot image memory for temporarily storing representations of all marks on a ballot sensed as the ballot passes a mark sensing station; and a digital totals memory for maintaining incrementally up-dated totals accumulated for each vote marking position on the ballot. Also included is an interlocking circuit which prevents the accepting and feeding of any ballots, for example, until after a key operated switch has been properly actuated.

Claims

1. A ballot reading and vote counting system comprising:

ballot feeding and mark sensing means which operates to move a ballot past a pair of optoelectronic reading heads one of which senses positional indexing marks another of which senses vote marks and each of which senses ballot identification code marks;

numeric printer means operating to imprint a paper tape containing a series of two numbers, typically each four digits in length the first of which uniquely identifies the total which is printed as the second number, these numbers commencing after a series of seven one-digit numerals, forming a precinct identification number;

digital programmable read only memory means which is erasable and electrically reprogrammable and which contains an instruction word, each represented by a plurality of bits, for each possible address of said digital programmable read only memory means and which thereby contains an instruction for each possible vote marking position on all ballot formats capable of interpretation by the system, one sub-portion of memory addresses, which may be termed page 0 of memory, causing precinct identification digits to be printed from said programmable read only memory means;

a further digital memory means which may be termed ballot image memory, for storing an image of all marks sensed as a ballot passes the mark sensing means and retaining the ballot mark image until those marks determined to be valid have caused the corresponding below-described main memory totals to be incremented;

a still further digital memory means which may be termed main memory, capable of incremental up-dating of totals as indicated by corrected ballot image memory marks, each main memory address containing a plurality of bits sufficient to encode a number representing the system'"'"'s maximum vote counting capacity for each candidate or each response to a question or measure;

a functional interlocking circuit means which prevents the accepting and feeding of any ballot until such time as a key operated switch has been actuated which causes every address of main memory to be selected in sequence and cleared to zero whereupon a printout is initiated which lists the precinct identification number followed by the series of printout total identification numbers and the corresponding zero totals read out of memory, and which prevents the accepting and feeding of any ballot after such time as the key operated switch has been actuated a second time causing totals to be printed out, such printout constituting the closing of polls and such interlock preventing the undetected unauthorized reading of totals prior to the close of polls;

control means which causes the header portion of each ballot to preset the high order several bits of memory address (termed page number) and the low order several bits to start counting from zero for each index mark (clock mark) sensed (the low order group of bits termed line number) with overflow from a full line count causing the page number to increment and requiring no logical limitation to the number of lines contained on any single ballot and which causes each mark sensed on a ballot to be registered as a bit stored at the page and line address of said digital programmable read only memory means corresponding to the address count at which that mark is sensed;

further control means which causes the number of marks sensed within the boundaries of each office, question or issue to be compared with the maximum allowable number of votes permitted for one voter for that office, question or issue and a status bit recorded in the said digital programmable read only memory means wherever the permitted number of votes has been exceeded so that no marks from overvoted offices, questions or issues will be incremented into main memory totals but instead the fact of overvote will be incremented in the overvote storage memory address for that particular office, question or issue, and which will therefore cause all marks recorded in said digital programmable read only memory means without presence of the overvote status bit to be incremented at the corresponding main memory address;

second further control means which will verify that the defined number of header (page number) bits have been sensed prior to the sensing of coincident printed marks by each read head and that exactly the proper number of index (clock) marks have been sensed as programmed in the programmable read only memory means at the end of ballot and that at least one mark has been sensed by the mark reading head and will inhibit the updating of all memory totals except page zero line zero in the event that any of the foregoing verifications cannot be made and will activate an ink marker placing an identifying mark on the back of any ballot whose marks have not been included in the tally, page zero line zero storing the number of ballots fed but not read;

third further control means which will provide for a single vote mark on a ballot indicating the party choice of a voter causing every candidate of the chosen party on that ballot to receive a count with further provision that if a vote is placed for a candidate of a party other than of the party choice, in that office only, the exception vote will be counted rather than the party vote; and

fourth further control means which will tabulate recall votes and candidates in accordance with recall laws which require a vote of YES or NO but not both on the recall question in order to enable counting of votes for replacement candidates marked on that ballot.

2. A vote tallying system comprising:

a programmable read only (control) memory for storing a number of instruction words, a group of which instruction words coincides with possible voting positions on a plurality of ballot cards, each instruction word represented by a plurality of bits, said plurality of bits including a low order group thereof for providing discrete classification of each possible voting position relative to party affiliation if any, question/issue, write-in or inactive voting position relationship and a high order bit for providing office area demarcation data, ballot card demarcation data and number of votes to be allowed per office on any one ballot card, another group of which instruction words provide for storing binary coded decimal numerals in any desired sequence, said programmable read only memory having a plurality of input address lines for selecting each instruction word and an output line for each bit of said instruction word;

a digital (image) memory providing one bit of storage for each possible voting position on a plurality of ballot cards for the temporary storage of binary image of the votes read from any ballot card and for storage of a single bit generated relative to each office, such generated but to provide a temporary control flag for any office wherein the number of votes recorded for such office from the reading of any single ballot card, exceeds the number of votes allowed for such office, said digital (image) memory having a plurality of input address lines for selecting each location of storage, a control line for writing into or reading out of a selected location of storage, an input line for setting the storage bit of a selected storage location to its binary "one" or binary "zero" state during a memory "write" operation and an output line for sensing the binary one or binary zero state of the bit at the selected storage location during a memory "read" operation;

a digital (totals) memory providing a plurality of bits of storage for each possible voting position on a plurality of ballot cards for the long term storage of binary coded decimal numerals representing accumulated totals of votes tallied for each voting position, overvotes detected for each office, ballot cards tallied of each ballot card type and total of invalid or mis-read ballot cards not tallied, said digital (totals) memory having a plurality of input address lines for selecting any location of storage, a control line for writing into or reading out of a selected location of storage, one each input line for setting each bit of a selected storage location to its binary "one" or binary "zero" state during a memory write operation and a plurality of output lines for sensing the binary one or binary zero state of each bit of a selected storage location during a memory read operation;

control means for addressing said input address lines of all three memories simultaneously for causing, one at a time, the coincident location of each memory to be available for a "read memory" operation or for each memory other than the programmable read-only memory to be available for a "write memory" operation; and

control means for independently selecting either the image memory or the totals memory or both to be active during any read memory or write memory operation.