Donnald K. Anderson: Electronic Voting

The consequence of electronic voting has been certainly
a less dramatic and theatrical way of recording the nation’s
decision-making process, because the vote by electronic device
is all but silent, except for the undercurrent of Members
milling around on the House Floor as they’re casting
their votes, using their cards. But it has made the process
far more transparent since now it’s in a format that can be
easily conveyed and immediately conveyed to the public.
Voting in the House was something of a mystery,
unless you were present in the chamber when the roll was called,
and attentive to the Members’ responses, and then,
of course, people in the gallery then, as now, could not take notes.
You didn’t know until the next day when the vote was recapitulated
in the Congressional Record how the Members individually had voted.
Now, of course, the state of the vote is known immediately,
both numerically and how each Representative has voted,
or if he or she has voted, because it displays in the chamber
of the main display, which shows the names of all
the Representatives and how they have recorded, and the
summary displays, which show the state of the vote
at any given moment as the vote is taking place.
And, of course, now that information is available to anyone,
anywhere who wishes to have access to it,
so it has created a transparency.