Why did we vote in pencil?? Hmmmmm...

[Woody23]

[ummmm]

Play hard to get....lol

Or take Danny Dyers advice....

[Mamyalynne]

Take it steady and don`t presume too much, you have been apart a long time. Show interest in her past and give youselves time to reconnect, lots of luck TT ♥

[Mamyalynne]

Goodnight am off now!

[Mr Veritas]

That's a very good question Woody.
Ever since I voted first in 1945 it's been in pencil.
Of course in 1945 it couldn't have been in fountain pen ink,only the well off had fountain pens.
It would have taken too long with plain nib pens.
Biros hadn't been invented yet,so maybe it's just a hangover from then?

[B00]

Thank God Mr V has brought the topic back!

I voted with a pen, only thing provided- no pencils in sight.

[boxtops]

The one tied to my booth was kinda thick, like a crayon...

[Mr Veritas]

Much like most MP's then boxtops?
Kinda thick
and like a crayon(childish).
LOL

[askyourgran]

TT is a babe magnet no less!

We had a postal vote this year we had to use black pen.

[cupid04]

and why do we put a cross, instead of a tick?

[boxtops]

Does the cross go back to the days when the majority of people couldn't write their names, so an X was used as their mark?

[Mr Veritas]

cupid,
I think when universal suffrage(for men at least) came in,many of the working class male voters could not write.
However,they were used to putting their mark as in "John Smith his mark" which was an X on documents.So I think the authorities thought that an X would be easier to explain than a tick.

[Mr Veritas]

Snap boxtops,
Great minds eh?

[boxtops]

Well of course, MrV!

[mike11111]

The reason for using pencil is largely an historical one. Before the Electoral Reform Acts of the 19th C, people would vote in ink, by signing their names on the ballot paper. With the advent of the secret ballot this was replaced by a cross (mainly to allow the illiterate to vote). At the time fountain pens were in their infancy and ball-point pens had not even been thought of. The only alternative would have been an inkwell with a nibbed pen. It would have not taken too much imagination for someone to go into a polling station and pour glue or sand into the inkwells, in the secrecy of the polling booth, thus creating electoral chaos.

[Laborintus]

We vote in pencil so that our vote will give some politic party the lead.