Voting and Counting
In each round of an exhaustive ballot the voter simply marks an 'x' beside his or her favourite candidate. If no candidate has an absolute majority of votes (i.e., more than half) in the first round, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated while all other candidates advance to a second round. If there is still no candidate with a majority then the candidate with the fewest votes is again eliminated and there is a third round. The process repeats itself for as many rounds as are necessary for one candidate to achieve a majority. If necessary, the election will continue until only two candidates remain. When this occurs one of the two must achieve an absolute majority.
Between rounds, the voter is entirely free to change his/her preferred candidate for whatever reason, even if his/her preferred candidate has not yet been eliminated from voting.
Read more about this topic: Exhaustive Ballot
Famous quotes containing the words voting and/or counting:
“It’s not the voting that’s democracy, it’s the counting.”
—Tom Stoppard (b. 1937)
“What we commonly call man, the eating, drinking, planting, counting man, does not, as we know him, represent himself, but misrepresents himself. Him we do not respect, but the soul, whose organ he is, would he let it appear through his action, would make our knees bend.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)