Editing Voting machine (section)

====Levers====
Lever machines were commonly used in the United States until the 1990s.  In 1889, [[Jacob H. Myers]] of [[Rochester, New York]], received a patent for a voting machine that was based on Beranek's 1881 push button machine.<ref>Jacob H. Myers, ''Voting Machine'', {{US patent|415549|U.S. Patent 415,549}}, November 19, 1889.</ref>  This machine saw its first use in [[Lockport (city), New York|Lockport, New York]], in 1892.<ref>[https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B04E0DB1F39E233A25750C1A9629C94639ED7CF Republicans Carry Lockport; The New Voting Machine Submitted to a Practical Test] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160819212034/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B04E0DB1F39E233A25750C1A9629C94639ED7CF |date=August 19, 2016 }}, in the [https://www.nytimes.com New York Times] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200312005902/https://www.nytimes.com/ |date=March 12, 2020 }}, Wed. April 13, 1892; page 1.</ref>  In 1894, Sylvanus Davis added a straight-party lever and significantly simplified the interlocking mechanism used to enforce the vote-for-one rule in each race.<ref>S. E. Davis, ''Voting Machine,'' {{US patent|src=uspto|526668|U.S. Patent 526,668}}, September 25, 1894.</ref>  By 1899, Alfred Gillespie introduced several refinements.  It was Gillespie who replaced the heavy metal voting booth with a curtain that was linked to the cast-vote lever, and Gillespie introduced the lever by each candidate name that was turned to point to that name in order to cast a vote for that candidate.  Inside the machine, Gillespie worked out how to make the machine programmable so that it could support races in which voters were allowed to vote for, for example, 3 out of 5 candidates.<ref>A. J. Gillespie, ''Voting-Machine'', {{US patent|628905|U.S. Patent 628,905}}, July 11, 1899.</ref>

On December 14, 1900, the U.S. Standard Voting Machine Company was formed, with Alfred Gillespie as one of its directors, to combine the companies that held the Myers, Davis, and Gillespie patents.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=kCE7AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA773 The Manual of Statistics:  Stock Exchange Hand-book, 1903], The Manual of Statistics Company, New York, 1903; page 773.</ref>  By the 1920s, this company (under various names) had a monopoly on voting machines, until, in 1936, [[Shoup Voting Machine Corporation|Samuel and Ransom Shoup]] obtained a patent for a competing voting machine.<ref>Samuel R. Shoup and Ransom F. Shoup, ''Voting Machine'', {{US patent|2054102|U.S. Patent 2,054,102}}, September 15, 1936.</ref>  By 1934, about a sixth of all presidential ballots were being cast on mechanical voting machines, essentially all made by the same manufacturer.<ref>Joseph Harris, Voting Machines, Chapter VII of [http://www.vote.nist.gov/election_admin.htm Election Administration in the United States] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090831084621/http://vote.nist.gov/election_admin.htm |date=August 31, 2009 }}, Brookings, 1934; pages 249 and 279–280.</ref>

Commonly, a voter enters the machine and pulls a lever to close the curtain, thus unlocking the voting levers. The voter then makes his or her selection from an array of small voting levers denoting the appropriate candidates or measures. The machine is configured to prevent overvotes by locking out other candidates when one candidate's lever is turned down. When the voter is finished, a lever is pulled which opens the curtain and increments the appropriate counters for each candidate and measure. At the close of the election, the results are hand copied by the precinct officer, although some machines could automatically print the totals. New York was the last state to stop using these machines, under court order, by the fall of 2009.<ref>[http://www.pressconnects.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070810/NEWS01/708100363 "Lever voting machines get a reprieve in NY"], ''[[Press & Sun-Bulletin]]'' ([[Binghamton, New York]]), August 10, 2007{{dead link|date=March 2021}}</ref><ref>Ian Urbina. [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/us/politics/05voting.html States Prepare for Tests of Changes to Voting System] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210125122457/https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/us/politics/05voting.html |date=January 25, 2021 }}, ''[[New York Times]]'', February 5, 2008</ref>