BALLOT • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Ballot

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/bˈælət/ Listen

noun

Ballot n.

Originally, a ball used for secret voting. Hence: Any printed or written ticket used in voting.

The act of secret voting, whether by balls, written or printed ballots or tickets, or by use of a voting machine; the system of voting secretly. "The insufficiency of the ballot."

The whole number of votes cast at an election, or in a given territory or electoral district.

The official list of candidates competing in an election. "There are no women on the ballot."

Ballot box,

(a)

a box for receiving ballots.

(b)

the act, process or system of voting secretly; same as ballot (2). "The question will be resolved by the ballot box."

verb

Ballot v. t. To vote for or in opposition to. "None of the competitors arriving to a sufficient number of balls, they fell to ballot some others."

Ballot v. i. (past & past part. balloted; pres. part. balloting) To vote or decide by ballot; as, to ballot for a candidate.

See images of 'Ballot'

Etymology of 'Ballot'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Ballot" Quotes from Famous Books

... completely all ordinary political conditions, as they obtain elsewhere in the United States, are without account in Utah, I have but to cite you to the fact that after the recent election, which gave 57 members out of 63 on joint ballot to the Republican party, and when the question of my successor became a matter of great anxiety to numerous aspirants for this place, the discussion was not concerning the fitness of candidates, nor the political popularity of the various gentlemen who ...

— Conditions in Utah - Speech of Hon. Thomas Kearns of Utah, in the Senate of the United States • Thomas Kearns

... say they believe such nonsense? And how can they think it is evidence of goodness to believe it? They say it takes a horribly wicked man to doubt one of those yarns; and to come right out and say honestly, "I don't believe it," will elect you, on the first ballot, to a permanent seat in the lower house. Mr. Talmage says four out of five Christians "try to explain away" these tales by giving them another meaning, and he urges them not to do it. He says, stick to the original story in all its literal bearings. The advice is certainly honest, ...

— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener

... America such charm, such character, such true elegance as here—and nowhere else such an overwhelming sense of finality!—the doom of a civilization founded upon a crime. And yet, how much has the ballot done for that race? Or, at least, how much has the ballot done for the majority of that race? And what way was it to meet this problem with the sudden sweeping folly of the Fifteenth Amendment? To fling the "door of hope" wide open before those within had learned the first steps of how to ...

— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister

... I voted. I voted the Publican ticket, they called it. You know they had this Australia ballot. You was sposed to go in the caboose and vote. They like to scared me to death one time. I had a description of the man I wanted to vote for in my pocket and I was lookin' at it so I'd be sure to vote for the right man and they caught me. They said, ...

— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration

... A ballot was taken and the brethren named were elected. After the benediction by the President, recess ...

— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various

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